Snowy Chains of a Trojan Horse
by RustedFanfictions
Summary: (COMPLETELY DISCONTINUED AND UNDERGOING RECONSTRUCTION)
1. Laughing Stock

_**Laughing Stock**_

Hey guys, I'm putting down Regenesis **for a WHILE!**

**Formalities:**

**Disclaimer: **I do not own RWBY, that belongs to Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth extensively. I do not own any references made in this Fanfiction (Red vs. Blue, Rooster Teeth) (Fairy Tail, Hiro Mashima) (Destiny, Bungie). I do, however, own any and all OCs as well as Twisted Plot.

**Future Changes: **This Fanfiction is prone to changes sometime in the nearby future, I apologize for any confusion whatsoever.

**Respects: **Monty Oum will live on in RWBY, Red vs. Blue, and especially in our Fanfictions, whatever they may be.

**Announcements: **I'm putting down Regenesis for a while because my sister corrupted the file a little. I'm going to copy, paste and proofread the chapters before reposting them if need be. For now, I'm just going to screw around with some ideas that have been floating in my mind for a while. Positive critiques, shout out references, love the show. Have fun, all o' yall!

Now, for the love of God, let the Fanfiction begin!

**-= *Laughing Stock* =-**

**-= *Amphitheater* =-**

**-= *3rd Person POV* =-**

It had been a while since teams RWBY and JNPR have taken notes on other students' abilities other than themselves. They usually just winged it and see what they could do and they would win, especially Jaune. Pyrrha worked him to his bare limit before they found out his Semblance was a rather useful one.

Recovery.

He could not only heal himself of his injuries but could heal others. When every found out it was the Amazoness that had unlocked his Aura, she was inevitably teased by the blonde brawler who had a world of fun in the end even though the cat Faunas and the Heiress reprimanded her coldly. The little rose instead laughed at her expense and congratulated Jaune on his new 'girlfriend,' leaving Yang to laugh louder in her wake. Nora continued to talk on and on about this at lunch and Lie only continued to correct her on almost every sentence she spoke on the situation.

Their vacations hadn't been all that bad either other than being completely separated from each other.

Ruby visited she and Yang's father, Taiyang in Patch. They had a lovely reunion and Ruby continued to tell him everything that happened in the school so far.

Weiss went to go check on her company and her father, Jaeger Schnee, wouldn't tell her a damn thing about the whereabouts of Winter, her younger sister. Angering her further, she took the Royal Test and ended up losing.

Blake didn't really have anywhere to go to, so she chilled in her dorm reading some of her books, and occasionally, 'Ninjas of Love.' What she_ didn't _notice were the cameras Yang set up around their room.

Yang followed Raven Branwen, her supposed savior from the train wreck before Neopolitan tried kill her. She regretted it, but promised the woman to never tell their team about the things she told her.

Jaune went back to his humble home of Domre and apologized to his father for lying, but was surprised when he was actually glad he did it. Jaune Arc's father, Jack Arc, admitted to being too soft on the knight and was happy for his finding a team, and being a particular teammate to one of his ex's daughters. Jaune noted to never tell Pyrrha. On another note, Jack even upgraded Jaune's weapon for him, and he easily mastered it.

Pyrrha went back to her home of Troya in Mistral and apologized to her mother for leaving her school but was surprised when she was actually glad she did it. Pyrrha Nikos's mother, Theta Nikos, admitted to not picking out a better school and was happy for her finding a calling other than 'Champion,' especially being the partner of her ex's son. Pyrrha noted to never tell Jaune. On another note, she couldn't find her little brother, Patro, who loved to call himself, 'Locust.'

Nora went back to her home town of Jotun with Lie and the two especially had a good time. They both loved to hate, but hated to love the cold weather they received every day there in Atlas despite it being summer. The cold weather provided to ability to make snowmen and snow angels. They both noted to bring the others next summer.

Now, earlier the eight Hunters had said that they never really needed to note other students' abilities and that they could wing it and still win. Well, today, the first day after First Year Initiation, they were in awe of their own peers.

Let's recap:

When they entered the Amphitheater, they expected chump fights. But instead, they got a rule change from Ozpin. They would have to fight team on team. So, naturally, the two began conversing on and on about who and where to hit if they were called down and noted that if both teams went down to fight each other, they wouldn't hold back. So, as the bell rung its usual chime for Fourth Period, Combat Class, to begin, they quieted along with the others around them in wait for the fights to come to play.

They lamented as none of them were on time for the naming of the teams after Initiation. The seven Hunters were convinced by Yang to go out to a club on the night before Initiation, and after nearly getting arrested for trashing the place (Yang having done it a second time), they were too fatigued to stay on throughout Initiation.

Now, the first day of school, and they were curious about the First Year's weaponry. After a few matches, they were incredibly bored. Those few matches only had people in their teams with Classic weaponry. When they had seen the first few teams, every time they would look at Jaune who would hold up the upgraded Crocea Mors in anger at his and Ruby's team's antics. They would only laugh at his expense.

"And that's match!" Professor Goodwitch roared as a student's head was nearly cut off by a Tiger Faunas's weapons...claws...whatever they were! "Team SNOW wins!"

The crowd around teams RWBY and JNPR both roared in response, exchanging Lien left and right. Blake smirked at Yang who handed her twenty Lien.

"You're just jealous," Yang said. Blake simply ignored her.

"And now, would teams Trojans and Chains come down, please?" The two screens above the stage read on the left 'CHAS' and the right, 'TJNS.' Underneath were the names for each of the teams as Professor Goodwitch called them out, "On team CHAS, we have Crane Gunn, Herra Gunn, Anna Saww and Iridium Saww!" The team came out on stage underneath the screen sporting their name.

Four fully armored students entered the stage. As each were called out, the first wore a dark steel colored armor set with maroon trims. His visor seemed to have a smiley face on it, which freaked out the heiress. The second had the same dark steel armor only with light red trims. Her visor had a frowny face on it, confusing the cat Faunas. The third walked in with a light steel look and maroon trims. Her visor seemed normal enough, sporting a copper look. The fourth had the same light steel look with light red trims. Her visor, the same copper look.

The Gunns pulled out two large chain guns and aimed them for the other side of the stage, and eerie laughs through what seemed like radios echoed from the two, even making the blonde brawler shiver from the sheer freakishness from them. The two Sawws pulled out large chainsaws and began to laugh an even creepier one as they did so, yet again, eliciting shivers from everyone.

On the end of the chain guns lay their own yellow faces, one with a smiley face and one a frowny face.

"On team TJNS, we have Troja Iris, Joan d'Arc, Patro Nikos and Winter Schnee!" Jaune, Pyrrha and Weiss each made their own respective jaws fall to the floor.

"Joan?!" ,., "Patro?!" ,., "Winter?!"

Troja seemed to come out first, blonde hair flowing briskly to her side in her usual pony tail, sporting an ear to ear grin as people freaked out at her skyblue eyes. Joan was next, she had her own blonde hair tied to a braid and to the right, Jaune's jaw dropping lower as he saw her oceanblue eyes, similar to his own. Patro walked in in his usual maroon armor and smirked right at Pyrrha, who looked away in response. Winter, the fourth was almost yelled at by the heiress had it not been her friends as crystal blue met Winter's white irises.

Troja pulled out her weapon first, which seemed to be a very large crossbow. Joan simply pulled out her sword which promptly swiveled itself into a sickle. Patro pulled out his sniper rifle whose scope quickly turned into a sharp blade.

Winter simply grabbed her sword handle along with the sheath and pressed one button. Colors that barely showed themselves through little holes scattered throughout the sheath's exterior swiveled round and round until she clicked the same button again. She pulled out the sword which seemed to be a bright blue and slowly brought it down towards team CHAS.

"Winter, long range mode, rearguard with me. Patro, Joan, vanguard. Block the chainsaws," Troja commanded. They quickly complied and got into an arrow formation.

"What formation would this be?" the Schnee asked, curious about their 'new moves.'

"I must admit," the younger Nikos stated, "I am a bit curious as well."

"Arrow," Joan said while looking back towards Troja, "How about that?" she threw her a smile.

"Yes, this is Arrow Formation." The other three's grins widened, almost insanity sparkling in their eyes, screaming at the audience to run away. Almost daring them to make a move.

"Sawws, vanguard, we're rearguard," Crane ordered. The other three groaned as they readied themselves in a similar formation, through team TJNS wouldn't know what the enemy vanguard had in mind.

"Are you ready, you eight?" Professor Goodwitch asked curtly.

Team CHAS saluted while TJNS said scattered approvals in readiness.

"Very well, begin!"

Iridium pulled out his chainsaw, "Don't play with fire, kids." He smirked.

Anna pulled out her chainsaw, "Water is a friend _and_ an enemy." She smirked.

Patro and Joan barely blocked as the Sawws seemed to sprint at them with a deadly speed they didn't know they could muster. During the Sawws dash, their chainsaws revved up and caused sparks to fly as the weapons made contact. Iridium's spewed fire and Anna's spewed water.

The Gunns in the back merely mischievously laughed again before revving up their chain guns.

"One hundred Lien says Team TJNS can't handle the Chain Gunn Twins and the Chain Saww Twins!" Everyone around whoever had yelled that simply roared in approval. Pyrrha, Weiss and Jaune ignored them as they stood, hands clenched, the trio yelling for their family member to make it.

"Patro, don't let up on her!" Pyrrha exclaimed.

"Got it, got it! Be quiet!" Patro yelled back.

"Winter, conserve your Aura!" Weiss yelled.

"I know what I'm doing! Be quiet!" Winter yelled back rebelliously.

"Go, Joan!" Jaune yelled, "Or else!" Joan's eyes widened in fear as she realized what he meant by 'or else,' and began to push back on Iridium's blade.

"Iridium, don't tell me you're going to lose to _the _d'Arc!" Iridium began to push back again as his twin sister yelled at him.

"Pay attention," Patro yelled in jest at Anna who began to lose ground.

"That backup would be very useful right about now!" Anna yelled back at the Gunns, who laughed again as their chain guns revved up more.

"Rearguard, switch to vanguard! V formation! Joan, Patro, don't move!" Troja yelled. Troja and Patro jumped past the two and began firing at the Gunns, their bullets either ricocheting off of Herra' armor and simply stopping in their path on Crane's armor.

"Have a nice day," Crane said, "or else."

"Turn that frown," Herra said, "upside down."

The chain guns began to fire, and the Schnee and Trojan being the only ones with physical Semblances on their team, put their hands up, and white and silver colored hands, respectively, rose up. Winter created what looked like a small black hole that was a bright white and it began to suck in bullets from Crane's chain gun. Troja however, clenched her fists and crossed them in the air above her, like two punches, raising a block of light blue energy, the sight of silver tinted it every so often as the ray of a shield blocked the oncoming bullets from Herra.

"Finish up with them, quickly!" Winter yelled back at her teammates, "I don't know how long I can hold my Vortex!"

"Got it," Troja yelled, chamberring her fists on the sides of her ribs before punching outward with a stop of her foot, launching the blue wall at Herra who was immediately launched into the wall behind Crane.

"No, Herra!" Crane stopped firing, looking back.

"Charge, Winter!"

"I can't!" Winter put her hands on her knees and panted, "Out of...Aura..."

"Troja, we got these two," Patro yelled, grunting a little, "Get 'em!" He turned his attention back to Anna, pushing a little more as she stepped back.

Troja looked back at Crane, who found his bearing and began to rev up his chain gun again. "You're going to pay for that," he said as the barrels spun faster every second. Troja's gun mechashifted into a pulse rifle. Silver gleaming and shining brighter than the crossbow it was before.

"I know..." Troja said, before sprinting as fast as she could towards him, gun raised. Seeing the charge, Crane activated his boots with a command Troja couldn't hear, they planted themselves into the ground, screws digging into the floor. The chain gun began to fire again, leaving Troja no choice but to weave around the bullets as she herself began shooting the same blue light she had used as a wall earlier.

The second she made contact with him, she kicked him in his midriff. This caused him to fly back despite being literally embedded to the floor with his boots. She put her weapon back on her back where she had unsheathed it from, picked up his weapon and revved it up. Iridium and Anna, thinking it was Crane again, began to push forward with more confidence. Anna, more so. Joan and Patro, however, lost ground on purpose in order to run from the barrage as quickly as possible when Troja would fire it.

Right as the weapon fully revved up again, Troja fired as Joan and Patro jumped out of the way, leaving Iridium and Anna speechless when they looked back as the flurry of bullets landed on them, causing them to fly back, embedding them into the wall on the other side of the stage.

Professor Goodwitch called the match, "And that's match!" she yelled, "The winner is Team TJNS!" Everyone roared in response, the guy from earlier losing his hundred Lien, splitting it between an angry Heiress and Arc. The two smirked at each other before heading back to their seats. The two grinning madly, Pyrrha joined in.

"What's up with you three?" Yang asked.

They simply pointed at their family members, making Yang go, "Oh~!" in response.

Troja threw the chain gun to the ground and ran back to Winter and put a complimentary slap on her back, "Good job, Winter! Better than that King Taijitsu we barely managed to kill in Initiation!"

"I barely...did anything...that time..." Winter got out through pants.

"Sure, you did!" Troja said a little louder in comfort, "If it wasn't for your Vortex, I'd be dead." She draped the Schnee's arm over he shoulder and began to help her walk out, "Now, come on. We still have four more periods and you're required to take six today. Two periods should be enough to recover your Aura."

Patro and Joan soon joined the two, "How's it going?" Patro asked quickly, "Are you hurt?"

"No, Patro," Winter said with a smile at him, "I'm fine."

"You can talk to your boyfriend later, Winter," Troja said holding the blushing Schnee, "For now, you need to rest."

Joan headed over to the Gunn Twins and helped rip them out of the wall by pulling every which way, but to no avail.

"You have to pull from the center of gravity," Crane said, "Grab my groin plate."

"Ew!" Joan yelled, "No! I don't want to touch you there!"

"W-What about me?" Herra asked, obviously flustered, "I-I'm a girl..."

"You, I'm fine with," Joan said, easily pulling out the chain girl.

"Now..." Herra said, grabbing Crane's groin plate and easily lifting him out, "All better," she jested, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Yeah, whatever..." the Chain Gun Twins stared at Joan who only smiled back.

"Why did you help us?" Herra asked. Crane was also curious but decided to leave the question to his twin sister, "We could've just struggled our ways out."

"Whether its a friend or an enemy," Joan said with a wink, "I'll help them when they're in need!" She quickly turned heel towards the Saww Twins who were in the same predicament.

After learning to pull from the groin plate, Joan easily helped Anna out, who helped her twin brother. They asked the same question and received the same answer. Joan happily waved goodbye before catching up with their waiting teammates. Team TJNS soon left the stage.

The two pairs of Twins regrouped when the otherstudents began leaving for fifth period as the bell rung, "She's really nice..." Anna said.

"Yup," Herra said, "And that Troja girl..." she trailed off, "She's really good at what she does."

"Like Crane!" Iridium half-yelled, somehow lifting the morale of the four.

"Yeah," Crane said with a hand scratching the back of his head in embarrassment, "But I made that stupid call. If I didn't-"

"Crane," Herra cut him off, "It's okay. One mess up and then we fix it later, right?"

"Yeah." He smiled at them, "Whaddya say?" he placed a fist up in the air, "No one's perfect?"

The three of them punched his fist, "Not yet!"

Herra grinned at her brother's honestly stupid outro he made up, he returned it as the four walked off of the stage, weapons in hand, ready for whatever came at them.

**-= *Field Trip* =-**

**-= *Dust Chemistry Class, Fifth Period* =-**

"Ugh," Professor Peach groaned, "I'm out of Sapphire Dust again..." she turned to the class who had been waiting for a while. "Anyone up for a field trip? We don't have to take any of the other classes, and I'll even notify Ozpin who will undoubtedly allow a trip for the rest of the day."

"What about those who want to stay?" someone in the back asked.

"You'll have to read three chapters tonight on Sapphire Dust Chemistry instead of one."

"I'm in," he quickly said. The others soon agreed.

"Where are we headed for?" Troja asked. She loved field trips but was always cautious everywhere she went. She didn't want to head somewhere that was uncharted. Though this may be least probably due to the fact that they had to get an item from somewhere where it has always been harvested.

"The Sapphire Mountains," said the Professor, "It's just north of Forever Fall...that was a disaster last year..."

"What happened last year?" Crane asked. For some reason, he and his team always had their suits one, even in the classrooms.

"We were attacked by an Ursa Major, and Jauny-boy here killed it," a kid said.

"Don't call me that!" Jaune yelled. Joan stifled a laugh and the Arc gave her a short glare.

"Would you like 'Vomit-boy?'"

"No, Crater Face!"

"I exploded one time _and _it was an accident," the girl in red retorted.

"How is exploding an accident?" Troja asked, tilting her head in confusion.

"Exactly, Ruby! Ow! S-st~op!" Jaune yelled, prying her hand off of his ear. Joan couldn't help but laugh with the blonde next to this 'Ruby' girl. Jaune gave her a glare as Ruby continued to gab at his ear, but when he confiscated her hands, she playfully bit his ear, causing him to yelp in pain. Blake noted to beat Jaune if he admitted it was because of her, Yang noted to tease them later and Pyrrha noted to beat Ruby later. The three girls' eyes twitched.

"Enough, guys," Professor Peach said, placating the anger-filled Auras now filling the room from said three girls. "Let's get this over with..."

"Right!" most kids in the room yelled as they headed out with the others, ready for anything. They had made it to the locker rooms after a while and began to empty the lockers of their gear.

"So," Troja spoke up to the Schnee, "Don't you think they should be relying on your company?"

"Well..." Winter trailed off, "Father's been busy with a lot of stuff lately, so he doesn't have enough time to go Dust hunting like he used to."

"What about you and your sister...uh, Weiss?" Joan stepped in.

"We want to become Huntresses," she said, "We don't have a lot of time, either."

"Does your family take mercenaries?" Troja asked.

"Sometimes, but were not ready to hire them as is, we don't have problems we have to take care of, so, no. Why?"

"I thought I told you," Troja half yelled, grabbing the Schnee's shoulders and shaking her, "I'm a merc! I'm up for hire! And I'm really bored right now!"

"We're going to get Sapphire Dust anyway," Joan soothed her with a placating hand, "Ask her later."

"Fine..." Troja grumbled, turning to grab her crossbow. "This job better be worthy for Amazon, though."

"Not everything has to be worthy for a weapon, Troja," Winter said, "I wouldn't mind getting Dao dirty," she lifted her sword in gesture.

"I know, but that's because that's an old Relic from the Forgotten Era," Troja rudely interjected on the idea, "It's probably been riddled with blood of slain enemies in its past years."

"Don't talk about Dao like that," she grabbed her weapon close to her and laid her cheek on it, "Don't worry, she didn't mean it."

"She freaks me out more than Ruby..." a girl in white, same eyes and all of the Schnee walked in.

"Big Sis!" Winter yelled, jumping into her.

"Calm down, Winter," she pushed her off, "I see you're in good hands here..."

"Yes," Troja got her attention, "I believe we do. Now, I'm Troja Iris, the leader of this team. I believe your name is Weiss?" she extended her hand to help her up.

"Yes," she then pointed to Winter, "and I believe Winter here was being a little bit of a butt." She smirked at Winter.

"H-hey!" she pouted and began punching lightly at Weiss's shoulder who continued to laugh.

"It's been a while since someone has made me properly laugh..." Weiss said quietly. Only Troja's ears were able to cuff the words. Instead of interrogating the heiress, she submerged the words deep into the recesses of her mind.

Winter then somehow dragged the heiress towards Patro who was obviously freaked out by her strength by the look spread about on his face, "Say hello to Patro!"

"H-hello..." he placed out a hand for her, to which she gladly took it, "My name is Locust-" he stopped as Winter glared at him and restated his name, "Patro Nikos."

"Y-you're the younger brother of _the _Pyrrha Nikos?!"

"Y-yes..." he scratched the back of his head, "She usually gets all of the credit, doesn't she?"

"For what?" Joan came into the equation.

"Pyrrha was known for a four way championship in Mistral, yes?" he looked up and into their eyes now, especially the heiress who nodded, "I got a three way championship, but I would've been the one with the fourth had it not been for losing the match after my last win..."

"Who'd you lose it to?" Weiss asked.

"Pyrrha herself..."

"W-wow..." Weiss said, "You must hold up good fortitude for beating her the other three times."

"No," Patro held up his hand, "That's the thing. She _wasn't _in those matches. That's the only reason why I won them."

"Patro," Weiss put a hand on his shoulder, "You're going to learn eventually, that you don't just win or lose a tournament just because of one person being there or not," her eyes then become fierce, "It's whether or not you know who and what they are."

Patro narrowed his eyes at her, obviously twitching, "Are you saying my sister is inhuman? Because if you are, you've got another thing coming," he raised his sniper rifle whose scope became a blade across the top of the weapon, gripping the stock at the end like a handle of a sword.

"N-no!" Weiss yelled, pulling her hands out in front of her and waving them around, "I'm saying if you know whether or not your sister _is _a champion."

"She had already been a three-way champion the day we fought. Both of us were," he put down his weapon, "The reason I lost was because we never talked to one another, we just...knew each other..." he let his arm fall limply to his side, weapon still gripped. "We never fought one another, we didn't know each other's strategies. Just brother and sister Dustbent on winning, greed beat me in the end..."

"Greed?" Troja said, entranced by his story. "How is greed a factor in all of this?"

"I was greedy for ammunition for Achilles," he raised his weapon in gesture, blade turning back into a scope, "It weighed me down. If I was scarce with my munitions, I'd been able to have more options in agility and conserve my ammo. Instead, I couldn't move as freely and overused my munitions. In the end, my clips were empty and I didn't dare point a sword at her. Did anyway and she beat me easily..." his eyes furrowed, "...with the flat side of the blade." He sat down and unconsciously rubbed the inside of his right foot.

Weiss blinked down at his metal booted right foot. His left was made of leather. "Why is your right boot made of metal?"

"She didn't turn the blade fast enough," he said bluntly. He pulled up the end of his pant leg a little, allowing them to see a large scar before more metal beneath the boot. Weiss gasped audibly enough for the group to her.

"That was my reaction..." Troja said quietly as she turned away to get her silver metal chestplate on, strapping leather around her back. Her right shoulder only covered as she placed a long, ebony pauldron on her left upper arm, along with trims of silver around the edges and the occasional etch of a white tiger on every plate. The chestplate only covered her upper torso, leaving a thin leather corset underneath. Jeans with leather strapped metal greaves covered her thighs and shins, along with the kneepads. Spaces inbetween the plates acted like oil for moving metal joints in a machine. She draped Amazon over her back and with a twist, her pony tail as well.

"Yeah..." Joan said as nonchalantly as possible, though a shiver was evident in her voice. She placed on her own chestplate but this covered her entire frontal torso, only leaving small spaces between her left shoulder guard and arm guards. Elbow pads visible and separable by eyesight between the plates of armor. Gauntlets covering the entirety of her hands and forearms. She wore full leggings, nearly hindering low stances. Greaves covering the entirety of her feet, the occasional seam filled with leather across every plate of armor. She placed a right spaulder on last, it was yellow with blue trims visibly separable, the occasional horse etch in turquoise. She placed her sword in a sheath at her hip. The shine of her entire silver armored form was entire except for the dull look of the right spaulder with her braid just over it.

Patro quietly let the pant leg fall over his metal boot again and lifted up Achilles and draped it over his back like the Trojan had done. He stood up with a sigh, causing the Schnee and Heiress to step back a few feet to let him breathe a little. He waited and tapped his leather boot for a second before quickly turning back to his locker. With his back still turned, he lifted his right hand and placed a few magazines and munitions. Leaving only four on the back of his belt. He placed two or three phials on his right pant leg. His thin chestplate and greaves on with an unusual pauldron on his right shoulder, letting a spike jut out in a creepy manner. Etched on the spike-like figure was a large horse buckling. He put on an arm guard on his left arm. He stroked his short, red hair to the right slightly.

The Schnee backed up to her locker just as quietly and put a simple black sheath on her left hip and placed Dao in it. She slapped at her light blue combat skirt that matched the color of her dress. Half tiaras held up pig tails on either side of her head of light blue streaked white hair. The tiaras holding up three spikes like Weiss's tiara had done on her oddly placed pony tail. Turning around, she waited as Troja and Joan stood up with sighs of their own. The four slammed the lockers shut and the heiress left with a goodbye.

"Is everyone ready?" Professor Peach yelled over everyone.

Scattered responses of readied up students reached her ears, "Good, let's go." The students began to pour out of the room, only to be stopped by Professor Goodwitch.

"Where do you think you're going?" she pushed up her glasses with two fingers.

"Ozpin already allowed us to go on a field trip. We're going to the Sapphire Mountains."

"Why didn't you let me take them, like last year?"

"We all know how that ended up, now didn't we?" Professor Goodwitch glared at her for a moment.

"Fine, be back by sundown, though." She walked past her for a moment before turning around again, "Or else."

"Or else, what, Glynda?" Professor Peach smirked at her, "Gonna cry to your boyfriend, Ozpin?"

"Ooooh~!" 's could be heard across the room from the class.

"Whatever..." she turned heel and walked away quickly. The evident clacking of her feet reaching from around the corner.

"She didn't deny it!" Patro yelled, causing an uproar.

"Calm down, calm down, class," Professor Peach soothed, "We don't want her coming around the corner brewing up a storm, would we?" the class ended in slight laughter as Professor Goodwitch called out to them from around the corner.

"I heard that!"

"Run!" Professor Peach yelled as large bricks were flung at them from behind.

**-= *Rock Climbing* =-**

**-= *Sapphire Mountains, Northern Forever Fall* =-**

"Professor Peach?"

"Yes, Troja?"

The class had been walking for a good while with their teacher. The occasional crunch beneath their feet ringing out for half a second before dying into nothing as they walked. Red grass rolling every so often up and down short hills. Normal bark colored trees with tinges of red staining each and every leaf. They were a few hundred meters away from the mountains before they saw the blue mountaintops through the short breaks between the tree's leaves. The clouds no longer touched the sky as a bright sun nearly blinded them.

"Why didn't they just call this forest 'Ruby Forest,' like the forest just outside of Beacon was called the 'Emerald Forest?'"

"Because that's just generic," Professor Peach bluntly responded.

"And because that's _my _name!" a girl in red called from behind.

"Ruby!" a blonde girl nudged her, "These forests were named hundreds of years before we were born!"

"I knew that..." she pouted.

Every once and a while, Patro would glance at his older sister who obviously knew he was there, just not paying attention to him and instead paying attention to the Arc on her right. Every time _those _two had looked at each other, they would blush a little a look away.

"Father was right," Patro said, startling her as he brushed up against her shoulder with a nudge, "He _is _your boyfriend."

"H-he is n-not!"

"Is too!"

"Is not!"

"Is too!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" the Arc called, "What are you two talking about?"

"Did you know that our mother is your father's ex?"

"Patro!" she yelled, covering his mouth.

"Heh heh," Pyrrha looked at Jaune as he scratched his head, "...yeah, my dad told me that..."

The three stopped. Pyrrha stared at him, mouth agape, hoping that he would say no more.

"And~?"

"PATRO, SHUT UP!" she slapped him across his face. But, before he could retort, Jaune cut him off.

"And~!" he grabbed Pyrrha's arm, dragging her off, "My dad called her my girlfriend. So, it _should_ be true."

Pyrrha, speechless, let him drag her away, a blush tinted her cheeks so dark it put her own hair to shame.

"Bwa-bwahahahha!" Patro let out, "That's hilarious!"

The rest of his team let out stifled laughs as Weiss walked over to Patro, "So, is this how you're going to spend your days with your 'rival?'"

"Yeah," Patro sighed in enjoyment of his sister's lament, "I am. What about yours?"

"Nah," she waved him off as the group started moving up again, "She isn't much of a rival but more of a massive pain in the neck."

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

Patro stopped her, "You shouldn't treat your younger sister like that.

With a huff, Weiss responded curtly, "You shouldn't be talking."

Patro only laughed at her expense. Troja, no longer being able to hold it in, laughed loudly.

"This is funnier than the White Rose Fanfiction!"

The entire group stopped and tensed at the insult. Troja looked around in confusion, "What?"

Weiss, blush tinted her cheeks and bangs hanging low over her eyes, slowly unsheathed her rapier. "Say that name...one more time..." she looked up at Troja with hate filled eyes. "I dare you! Scratch that!" she pointed her rapier at him, "I double dare you, mother-" a whistle blew over her words.

"Keep going!" Professor Peach whisper yelled at them after putting her whistle back in her pocket.

"Okay," Troja's wry smile went ear to ear, and eyes became large with malice as she pulled Amazon from over her shoulder. This made the heiress freeze a little as she did not want to believe her eyes when they told her that Troja's teeth sharpened as she smiled with a wry smile. Winter stepped in front of her older sister as Joan stood in front of Troja.

"Calm down, Weiss! It was only a joke!" Winter yelled at her.

"Don't do this, Troja! You might kill her!" Joan pleaded.

The two sheathed their weapons with their eyes shut and sighed. With a normal face, "No hard feelings?" Troja asked as she stuck out her hand.

Weiss gladly took it, "None." The two glared at each other for half a second before the group moved up again. Quiet chatter continued on around them and Troja swore she saw Lien. She shook her head in disbelief as they continued forward, only for the group to stop for a third time.

"What's White Rose?" Ruby ran up next to Weiss who instantly ran off ahead of the group.

"Girl," Patro said, putting a hand on her shoulder, "You do _not _want to know."

"My name is Ruby," she said with strain, "What. Is. White. Rose?"

"And I said," Patro looked her in the eye, "You. Don't. Want. To. Know." The two glared at each other before Yang spoke up.

"It's smut between Ruby and Wei-!" Blake put a hand over her mouth.

"And who?!" Ruby yelled.

"How do you know what smut means?" Troja said, interjecting on the conversation.

"I asked Weiss what it was when she accused Blake of reading it."

Blake glared at her, and Troja did not let this pass her eyes.

"What does she re-" Troja tried, only to be cut off by a flustered Weiss running in on the conversation.

"I didn't tell her what it meant directly!"

"I did!" the blonde said as she ripped the black haired girl's hand off of her mouth, "It means-"

"That's enough outbursts for today, understand?"

"Yes, Professor Peach," everyone responded as she turned heel and began to walk, causing the class to skip in their steps just to keep up with her.

The group, quieted, finally made it to the edge of Forever Fall and stared in awe of the mountains. The slope slowly rolling up before becoming more steep with rocks nearly overhanging. Had anyone overlooked it, they would've easily missed the cliffhangers there and the ominous blue glow every so thirty meters.

"The bottom looks so...b-"

"Boring, I know, Mr. Snow."

"I was going to say 'barren,' but that works too." The leader of team SNOW smirked at her and she merely huffed in response.

"Taiga," one of the members said, "Don't insult the best teacher here."

"Am I really the best?" she asked with a brow raised at them.

"Versus the other teachers?" the boy now known as 'Taiga' said, "Yes."

She turned around hiding her smile before saying, "We need to climb. This mountain is usually scavenged for Sapphire Dust, but now it is nearly as...barren," she said with pauses looking at Taiga before returning her gaze on the mountain she neared, "...as Mr. Snow here had called it."

Everyone groaned.

"Whichever teams gets the most will have their lowest grades heightened to a hundred," she gave them the incentive as clearly as possible.

The entire class roared in happiness and began to spelunk up the mountain.

"Patro, make steps for us," Troja said, "Joan, copy and repeat!"

"Got it!"

"Understood!"

Joan and Patro said before raising their hands up. Blue and maroon, respectively, encircled their hands and the rocks began to rip out of the mountains.

_Joan's Semblance, Mimic, is most certainly useful, _Troja mused, _At the same caliber of Patro's that is. Being able to manipulate Patro's Semblance, Convergence, like that, will make it easier for us to scale the mountain. And, if it comes to it, even get whatever the Dust is at the top._

"We got it!" Patro yelled, "Is fighting prohibited?"

"Hmm..." Professor Peach called someone on her phone, "Give me one moment."

After hearing Professor Peach ask a few questions on the phone, she quickly shut it off and turned to everyone in the class who stopped just to hear an answer, "Yes."

Just as fast as she had said it, students began to fight each other left and right, some teams even grouping together for protection and promises with help on tests, quizzes, even the occasional homework.

"Chains!" Troja yelled as they ran at them, weapons at the ready, "We should help each other!"

"What's in it for us?" they stopped their advance.

"I heard the Gunns and Sawws were all mercenaries, correct?" Troja asked, baffling the rest of her team.

"Yes."

"I'm a mercenary. We could work together on missions and we can split the Lien amongst ourselves and everyone wins. Deal?"

Crane looked to his side for a moment, before turning fully to his twin sister, "Herra?"

"Sure," she thought after a while, "What do we do?"

"Hold off the other's while we clear a path," Troja said, "We'll bring you up at the last second. That is, if Winter can handle her Vortex for that long."

Winter gulped audibly, "M-my Vortex?"

"Joan will help you," Troja landed her hand on her shoulder and looked at Joan, "Heard the Arcs and d'Arcs had a knack for large Aura Reserves." Yet again, Troja looked back to Winter, "She should regulate Aura to you to keep you afloat."

Winter smiled at her, "Thank you."

"Alright then," she turned back to the other seven, "Here's the plan-"

After discussing their plan with them, their plan went without a hitch as Troja and Winter ran up mounds of unnaturally moved rocks and made it to the top. Patro scaled the mountain without using his Semblance for himself, and instead focused it on moving Joan to the ledge the other two stood upon. When he made it to the top, he said, "Joan, your turn."

"Got it..." she said as her hand glowed an ethereal blue and Winter's a bright white. Two vertical Vortexes, facing downward, aimed for the Chains.

"Gunns, Sawws!" Winter called, "Come on!"

"Got it!" Crane and Herra yelled simultaneously as their boots unhinged from the ground and they ran underneath the Vortexes. They were brought up as the Sawws came up underneath them as well.

When the four of them reached the inner cone of the Vortexes, Winter and Joan moved the Vortexes with them and dropped them onto the ledge they sat upon. Troja and Patro already hard at work beating the mountain with their weapons.

"Joan, Winter! Take over mining here! We rendezvous at the foot of the mountain, got it?"

"Understood!" they all yelled as the others began to scale the mountain. Joan's sword transformed into a sickle before he began to pick at the mountain. Winter's Dao chopping at it.

"Lux was _not _made for mining," Joan said angrily as she struck the mountain again, pulling out a few Sapphire Crystals.

"Neither was Dao," she gestured to her weapon before chopping at the mountain again, "But we need the grades for this. _And _we have to keep teams off of our backs."

"Right!" she yelled, slamming the sickle into the mountain again.

"Sawws, stay here, the rest of us got this!" Crane yelled as they continued to scale the mountain further and further.

"Got it..." the two groaned.

"Foot of the mountain, got it?!" Troja yelled as she continued up.

"Yeah, yeah, we got it. Geez," Anna growled.

After leaving Patro and Herra behind, Crane and Troja continued to the top of the mountain.

"What are we doing?!" Crane yelled over the harsh winds that began to enshroud them as they walked through the light blue snow. The occasional short blizzard grazing over them.

"There's something bound to be at the top of high importance!" Troja yelled, "Maybe we'll get a reward!"

"I'd rather risk my life on something that _won't_ kill me!"

"Where's the fun in that?!" Troja yelled back at him as she began pushing on the blue, snow covered slope they walked upon, "What's the point of being a Mercenary if you're not going to put your life on the line?!" another heavy blizzard settled in before just as quickly disappearing, "What's the point of being a Hunter?!"

Crane did not respond.

Finally, rounding a corner, they made it to an area with a wind standstill, with a cave just underneath the summit. Instead of checking it for Grimm, they looked out to the sun that hung low in the sky in front of the cave. Not low enough to touch the horizon, but enough to look like it was a meter or two from the horizon from where they stood. The sky began to glow an ominous orange.

"Should we check the cave behind us?" Crane asked, uneasy about it just sitting there unchecked.

"Nah, Professor Peach would've warned us if there were Grimm out here."

"There were plenty of Grimm on the way up. Don't you remember?"

"Well," Troja still doubted the idea, "I doubt there would be anything in _that _tiny cave."

Just as she finished that, a roar elicited from it.

Crane turned heel and planted his boots into the ground, "You were saying?"

"S-shut up!" Troja yelled, pulling out Amazon. "At least this is worthy for Amazon."

"And for Happy."

"Who?"

He lifted his weapon, "Don't you see the smiley face on the end."

She facepalmed loudly before the two aimed their weapons back at the cave.

"Oh no..." Professor Peach said at the foot of the mountain, "I forgot about the Wyvern."

"Was that a Wyvern?" Crane asked.

"What's a Wyvern?"

"You've got to be kidding me, right?"

"No," she repeated. "What's a Wyvern."

"Well," Crane said as a claw from a black scaled hand slammed the ground just outside of the cave, "I guess you're about to find out..."

The cave being too small for a large creature such as a Wyvern to break through, was instantly shattered. Ice flying everywhere, Troja placed up a barrier of pure energy again.

"What is your Semblance called, again?" Crane asked, not really sure what to say after the barrier came down.

"Pulse," she said nonchalantly as she waited for the cloud of snow to lift, "Like a Pulsar Star."

"Oh~!" he said, "But wait, how do we know that much about Space, but not even have the technology to go _into _it?"

"Beats me," Troja said, "Government is always secretive about everything, anyways."

The cloud soon lifted and there stood a large, dragon-like creature. Its hands embedded into the skeleton of the wing, claws protruding out of them. The scaly creature turned it gaze on them, amber eyes staring at them with a few blinks and multiple tilts of the head on confusion before roaring again at them. It reeled its head back, before launching fire at them with a lunge.

Troja, lifted another barrier protecting the two.

"Happy would be _very _useful right about now!"

"Got it!" he revved up Happy. "It's ready, pull down your barrier!"

"Not until he stops spitting fire at us!" As she said that, the fire lifted and she dropped the barrier. Crane then fired his chain gun at it, causing the wyvern to roar in pain as it began to flap its wings, gaining flight.

"We may want to run..." Crane said all too late as the two were snatched up by the claws of its webbed feet. Soon flying off as it roared in more and more pain.

"Ahhhhhhh!" the two yelled, "How the hell are we supposed to get out of this?!"

"I-I don't know!" he yelled.

"Well, think of something!" she yelled back.

Everyone stared up at the two being dragged around by the wyvern and instead of fighting each other, all the ranged students began firing barrages of Dust Rounds at the avian class Grimm. Soon, a girl in clothing with multitudes of colors and a large hammer soon jumped, _quite literally,_ into the situation.

Foot on the underside of her hammer, left hand on the lower end of the hammer with a right hand in salute she launched. A smile that rivaled Troja's face plastered on her own as she laughed and whooped and screamed loudly in enjoyment of slammer her hammer on the head of the wyvern.

"NORA!" a boy, clad in green, yelled from below.

"Hehe!" she giggled, "Coming, Ren!"

"Was that all you could do?!" yelled a falling Crane.

"How should we know?!" Troja yelled back at him as she fell with him.

"A barrier would be very useful right now!"

"Got it!"

With large effort, she sported a large, soft barrier on the ground, to which they landed on. Sore, and not without bruises, Troja tumbled around trying to get up.

"Thanks, uh...Nora?" Troja lifted her hand for a shake, but only received a confused look from the girl. "Is something wr-"

"How do you know my name?!" she yelled. And before Troja could answer, she began to ramble on about random things, "Are you a spy. No! Even a detective?!"

"I apologize for Nora's antics," the boy in green came up and covered her mouth with his hand, "She usually like this."

"Ah," Troja and Crane said in unison.

"I take it you're Ren, then?" Crane spoke up.

"Yup, that's my last name though. It's Lie Ren."

"I'll just call you what everyone calls you," Troja said.

"I appreciate that." Before anyone could ask Lie what he had meant by that, they were quieted by a large screech from the wyvern earlier.

"Oh, we forgot about the wyvern..."

"What's a wyvern?" Winter asked as she came back into the group panting.

"That's what I said!" Troja yelled before Crane cut off any laughing that entered the group.

"Focus, guys! We need to take it down! I'll convince Professor Peach to give us _all _hundreds if we take it down quickly! Got it?!"

Properly motivated, the group roared in response. Soon, new barrages came from the foot of the mountain, as others came from around the sides. Crane then saw a flurry of bullets come from the center of the mountain.

"That's Herra..." he trailed off as she was able to accurately hit the wyvern in the face, "I'm not losing to her, though." He smirked as his boots embedded themselves into the ground and lifted Happy. The three barrels began to spin and the smile on the end of the gun began spinning, obscuring any proper view of the smile.

"Have a nice day," he said, "or else."

The chain gun began to fire powerfully at the wyvern, hitting its underbelly, causing it to scream uncontrollably.

"Haha!" he yelled, "Yeah!"

Just then, he hadn't noticed it beginning to breathe fire at him and barely dodged it. Well, he would've if he could've.

"Well..." he trailed off as the ball of fire neared him, "Sh-"

Herra looked down from the mountainside at her partner _and _twin brother. "Crane!" she yelled down at him as the ball of fire exploded on him. "No!"

She would've jumped down if it wasn't for the claw protruding through her stomach. The black, metallic claw dripped with a green liquid. When she looked down, the same liquid erupted from her stomach.

"No!" Patro yelled, only to quiet down when he saw the liquid, "Herra?"

The helmet visor lifted and showed her face. Smooth, silky. He was thrown off when he saw her eyes, a vibrant pink filled her irises. "I'm sorry that I didn't tell you before..." the claw was removed and she stood there, on her toes. Slowly, ever so slowly falling forward.

"No!" he ran to her, only to be blocked by the Grimm, "You..."

The Grimm lunged at him.

"Professor Peach!" the called turned around to be met with an all too familiar woman.

"Ah, Raven. Nice of you to join in on this fight," she said nonchalantly as she raised her wine glass no one knew she had, "Luscious should be able to handle this, don't you think?"

"Would've if you'd have fired by now, you idiot."

Professor Peach huffed, "I'm not the one who refused a teacher's position."

"That's because I was smart enough as is. How's it going?"

"Both Gunns are down. One by a Wyvern Fire Ball and the other by a Vex Praetorian."

"Ugh, Vex again? Those things are annoying," she said with contempt as she pressed a button on the sheath of her weapon and colors began to spin around at the top. It soon stopped on red and she pulled out her weapon. It extended as it was fully unsheathed.

"Aim for the head and then the chest," Professor Peach barely let out as Raven sprinted off. "Stupid Branwen..." she mumbled, "Dumber than your own daughter sometimes..." she glanced at Yang before the wyvern screeched above her after the smoke lifted a little.

She aimed the cup side of Luscious at it, filled with wine with a slight flame drifting off of it, "Take this, Wyvern." She pressed a clear button on the bottom that promptly fired at the Wyvern. It roared louder than anyone had ever heard an avian class Grimm yell before. Team RWBY put it at just a little louder than a Nevermore on a scale, however.

Anna looked up at the Grimm and growled, "Ugh, I can't believe I chose to be a close-ranger _only!_"

"We can fight the Vex Grimm though," Iridium twisted her around with a strong pull, "Come on, we have a load of Goblins to take on."

"Ugh, I hate these things! I like decapitating Grimm!"

"Well, decapitate them, then! They can't teleport without them!" the duo began to work flawlessly against them, Anna would decapitate one, Iridium would thrust a hit through its chest while it charged. This process was completed multiple times before Anna complained even more.

"Who had the nasty idea of giving the damn things armor platings, huh?!" she yelled as the tenth Vex Goblin fell.

"Well, Grimm Industries wanted to test them for war material...company didn't last for more than a year after experimenting with the Vex Grimm for so long. Now they grow the armor naturally."

"Well, this sucks," Anna said. "Can this get any worse?" Just then, a Vex Minotaur teleported in with a blinding blue flash. "And who the hell gave them teleportation abilities?!"

"The same people! And...and stop jinxing us!" the two growled in anger as they jumped around trying to hit the damn thing. They hated the old company to no end as they cut down the forces. After a while, piles of blackened red armor began to litter the ground as they killed more and more.

Just then, as they finished off the last Vex Minotaur, they turned to a screeching wyvern as it approached the two and more and more bullets tried riddle it as its brisk scaly figure as it continued for them.

"Well..." Anna said, looking for an exit. Upon finding none, she looked back at Iridium, "Nice knowing you, brother."

"And I you." The two watched as their doom approached them.

"..."

"Wasn't there an exit to the ri-"

"Don't spoil the damn moment!" Anna yelled.

"I thought you were a sadist, not a masochist!"

"Would a masochist want a quick death such as thee?!"

"No! Though I wouldn't mind a quick death..." he squinted his eyes shut with her and turned his head to the side as they waited for their doom, only for a rifle shot to ring in their ears and an annoyed avian class Grimm turned around with a pained screech. The two opened their eyes and through their bronze visors stared at the boy.

"Way to ruin the moment, Nikos..." Anna said.

"Do you two really _want _to die?" Patro asked.

"No, we just want people to pity us," Anna said bluntly.

"Pity or compassion," Iridium cut in. "Choose your poison."

"Shut up, Iridium. And...bad timing..."

"Yeah," Patro agreed, "It doesn't make sense to say it now."

"When would be a good time to say it then?!" Iridium fumed.

"When wondering how girls feel about their unreasonably short skirts at Myst Academy in Mistral," Patro smirked before getting slapped by Anna.

"I'm going to tell Pyrrha," she glared at Patro.

"Oh, no you don't!" he yelled, running around trying to catch her as she sprinted around Iridium, "Com'ere!"

He finally caught her and began to scratch her head with his right knuckle as he had her in a headlock with his left arm. "Gah, stop it!" she yelled at him. Iridium's mind screamed _cat face _when her eyes squinted in frustration as the Nikos relentlessly scratched her head.

"Are you two done flirting around," Herra said, jumping down.

"H-Herra!" Iridium yelled, pointing at her stomach.

"Don't worry, it's a secret, right, Nikos?"

Nikos stopped scratching Anna's head and looked up at her, "You betchya! Not even Pyrrha will know..." he trailed off as he grabbed Anna's chin and brought it close to his face with a glare, "As long as you don't tell her what _I _said."

"G-got it!" Anna squeaked as he let go of her and got up. She had hoped to Dust that he hadn't seen the red underneath her eyes.

"Wha'd he say?" Herra interjected.

"You...don't want to know..." Iridium said, defending the Nikos.

"What if I beat it out of you?" Herra asked. Unfazed, Patro quietly pointed at her stomach. "Noted..." she gulped a little.

"What did you think of her eyes, Patro?" Iridium smirked as he turned around at the blushing boy. The tint underneath Patro's eyes rivaled Herra's eyes.

"They're...nice?"

"Just nice?" Herra raised an eyebrow as her visor came up, revealing the pink orbs.

Diverting the conversation, Patro said "W-what about Crane's eyes. And Iridium and Anna's?"

"I'm the only one who had a failure in the eyes. Their eyes are just your average blue eyes," Herra smirked at him before her visor came down again.

"Should we check on Crane then?" Patro asked, "He took one hell of a beating at the foot of the mountain.

"Yeah," Herra said, "Let's go!"

Before the Sawws could ask, the chain girl and Nikos jumped down and slid towards the bottom. The Sawws overlooked the edge in curiosity.

"Ladies first?" Iridium asked, gesturing it with a hand.

"Why, thank you...but age before beauty..." she shoved him off the cliff.

"We're twins though!" he barely yelled as he slid down the cliff.

"You came out five minutes before I did!" She jumped off the edge.

Raven shook her head as she came out from behind a rock as Anna jumped off. "Crazy kids..." the avian class Grimm came around again.

"See ya, Grimm," she smiled cutely at the Grimm before she lifted her weapon. Soon, she thrust it down, causing a wave of red to split the Grimm in half. It evidently crashed into the mountainside as she jumped out of the way. Before anyone could see her, however, she vanished through a red rift that had appeared in the air from the red wave she created earlier. A flash of white obscured everyone's sight to which saw the rift as she jumped through.

"What just happened?" a student asked.

Professor Peach made up a story that when she fired her weapon, Luscious, a splinter from the explosive attack landed in the mountain, which evidently killed the Grimm later.

"Crane!" Herra yelled as she ran over, her midsection now bandaged up thanks to the Nikos.

"You excelled in medicine?" Pyrrha asked as he ran side by side with her.

"Yeah, pays off if you actually pursue _one _thing." He smirked at her and let his brows go up multiple times in suggestion.

"I-it's not like that!" she yelled, only for the Arc to run up next to her.

"Oh, really now?" he smirked at her.

"S-shut up, both of you!" she backhanded the both of them before running into the forest.

"Dammit! Patro Nikos!" he looked back at him.

"Ah, ah, ah," Patro said with a smile, stopping him, "Just because you're the boyfriend of my older sister, doesn't give you the ability to control me."

"I don't care! Get her!"

"I wasn't the one who made her outburst like that."

"You started it! I was only joking around."

"And you know how sensitive girls are," girls around them glared daggers at the back of his head. "Go get 'er, tiger."

"I hate you..." Jaune mumbled before running off. Patro soon joined Herra at Crane's limp form. A thin smoke still obscuring the wound a little.

"Get everyone away from here!" Patro yelled, pulling out a small kit no one saw him place on his belt earlier.

"Got it!" Anna yelled, "Iridium, let's go!"

"On it!" he acknowledged.

"Man, for a guy with a Semblance of a tank, you took one hell of a beating..." Patro said.

"Yeah..." Crane said, "That's what I get for being an a-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence!" Herra yelled. Patro quietly grabbed a clean cloth and began to dab at the wound. Feeling no pain, Crane only continued to interject at Herra.

"But I am...even if I'm not fully-"

"Stop saying those things!" she yelled. She brought her voice down to a whisper now, "You were born human. And that, therefore, makes you one. No matter how much our families fixes us up. That's what makes us so...different! It makes us..." she trailed off, trying to think of a word.

"Unique," Patro said as he began to mend the armor with leather strips. Fully obscuring the wound, he looked at the staring Gunns. "I said, you're unique. No one's the same...more different. Simply-"

"Unique," she finished for him. She put a hand on his shoulder, "Thank you. For this."

"No problem," he smiled at her. And, if it weren't for her visor, he'd had seen her evident tint of red beneath her eyes.

"Wait, wait, wait! Does...does he know?!" Crane whisper-yelled.

"Yes, Crane," she whispered nonchalantly.

"And I'm gonna keep it a secret."

"He also saved me from a Praetorian," she added. "Which we mistakenly thought was a Minotaur at first..."

He began to scratch his cheek. "Hehe...yeah...and that's how I found out that she-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence." He didn't need to hear it in her normal voice to know that she was serious. A whisper seemed enough.

"Y-yes ma'am!"

"Finally subjecting to women, eh?" Pyrrha asked as the smoke lifted.

"P-Pyrrha?!" he yelled, fearful if she knew.

"Don't worry, don't know what you guys were talking about. Seeing as they were whispers, I'll keep the conversation a secret."

"Thank you..." Herra said, helping Crane up. "We are in your brother's debt. Do not let us forget."

"I won't," she said as Patro helped Herra with Crane's other arm.

"Come on, Crane," Patro said, "Time to go." He grunted loudly as he carried him. "You're really heavy, you know that?"

"That's what I said!" Herra yelled.

"That is _the _worst insult I've ever heard directed at me..." Crane said before smirking at them, "of all time!"

The trio laughed immensely as they headed back to the group.

**-= *End of Chapter One* =-**

Well, that was longer than expected.

I will be putting out a few more chapters as I think about how Regenesis will fare from now on. Until then, enjoy a little more...normal series...

I'm thinking about ten chapters, but after the tenth, let's see how that'll go, eh? Hehe!

I'm thinking about Omakes. You should tell me what you want.

Until then!

Now, for the love of God, let the next Fanfiction begin!


	2. Trying

_**Trying**_

Hey guys, I'm back! I suck at proofreading, leave me alone! .

**Formalities:**

**Disclaimer: **I do not own RWBY, that belongs to Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth extensively. I do not own any references made in this Fanfiction (Red vs. Blue, Rooster Teeth) (Fairy Tail, Hiro Mashima) (Destiny, Bungie). I do, however, own any and all OCs as well as Twisted Plot.

**Future Changes: **This Fanfiction is prone to changes sometime in the nearby future, I apologize for any confusion whatsoever.

**Respects: **Monty Oum will live on in RWBY, Red vs. Blue, and especially in our Fanfictions, whatever they may be.

**Announcements: **I'm putting down Regenesis for a while, sorry. Now, last chapter, there were a lot of screwups! I'm going to tell you right now, Joan and Patro were the vanguard and Troja and Winter were rearguard AT FIRST during the match in the beginning of the chapter! Positive critiques, shout out references, love the show. Have fun, all o' yall!

Now, for the love of God, let the Fanfiction begin!

**-= *Jokes in a Fight* =-**

**-= *Somewhere in the Sapphire Mountains* =-**

**-= *Third Person POV* =-**

Herra looked down from the mountainside at her partner _and _twin brother. "Crane!" she yelled down at him as the ball of fire exploded on him. "No!"

She would've jumped down if it wasn't for the claw protruding through her stomach. The black, metallic claw dripped with a green liquid. When she looked down, the same liquid erupted from her stomach.

"No!" Patro yelled, only to quiet down when he saw the liquid, "Herra?"

The helmet visor lifted and showed her face. It seemed pale...smooth, silky even. He was then thrown off when he saw her eyes, a vibrant pink filled her irises. "I'm sorry that I didn't tell you before..." the claw was removed and she stood there, on her toes. Slowly, ever so slowly falling forward.

"No!" he ran to her, only to be blocked by the Grimm, "You..."

The Grimm lunged at him, and had it not been for Achilles's bladed scope, he would've lost his left arm. He quickly shifted around the claw that he held back with Achilles in his left hand and reeled in a little, aiming with his spike-like pauldron. Once he believed he aimed correctly, he lunged for the center of the Grimm's unusually natural armor and as he plunged it deep within its innards, a claw grazed his right arm, causing him to grunt a little in pain.

"I hate Vex..." he mumbled as he ripped it off of his spaulder. Herra, almost falling over, was instantly caught by her hand over the sheer cliffhanger where she once stood. Hanging over it like that, Patro could barely lift her with his right arm, left still attached to the edge of the cliffside.

"Damn..." he cursed, "You're really heavy..."

"U-uh..." she stuttered, "B-blame t-the arm-armor..."

"Is that a stutter I hear?" he asked coyly despite their situation, "Are you by any chance fat?"

"N-no!" she yelled at him, "M-may-"

"What was that?"

"Nothing! Just get me the Dust up!"

"Wait!"

"For what?!" she tightened her grip when she looked down. Tears almost threatening to come out from her unannounced fear of heights.

"Look, it's the Sawws. They're taking on some Vex Goblins, wanna screw with them and that Praetorian over there?"

Losing her care for heights, she indeed saw the two Sawws taking on the Vex Goblins. Looking over to the right a little, she saw a Vex Minotaur. "That's a Minotaur," she stated nonchalantly.

"It's a Praetorian," he corrected. "See the glint around it?" When she squinted with her eyes, she most definitely saw the glint.

"Yeah, it's a Praetorian, whatever. Now, can we get back up?"

"Newsflash, Herra," Patro said with a grunt, "Can't lift worth a damn! My right arm his shot!"

"By what?!"

"The Minotaur from earlier, it grazed my arm when I stabbed it with my spaulder!" He grunted louder with pain. "What the crap kind of suitcase are you holding?!"

Lifting the suitcase a little higher for him to see, she said, "It's the compact version of Frowny."

"Who the Dust is Frowny?!" Patro repeated the unusual name. He wasn't up for them at the moment.

"My chain gun, silly," she smiled brightly up at him, almost causing him to lose his grip in awe of her smile. "Would you mind paying attention by holding my hand a little tighter?"

Hearing near ludicrousy in her voice, he looked away with a blush evident on his face that did not go unnoticed by her. When he looked back down, she smiled a little brighter, and he grunted as he tried to lift her. "Damn my fetish for chu-"

"What was that?"

"N-nothing?!"

"Hmm..." she hummed, causing him to lift her more. _It's working! _she mused, _Flustering him with my hand makes him work harder? Noted._

She gripped a little tighter, and indeed it was true. Flustering him worked. She would've let her hand linger for a while had it not been for her already being pulled up the rest of the way. "Uh...can I have my hand ba-"

"No." Ignoring the logic in her thoughts, she held it with eyes shut, brows furrowed. After a little while, she gasped a little and reeled her hand back. He quickly grabbed his weapon.

"L-let's m-mess with the S-Sawws a little, e-eh?" she turned to smile brightly at him for a third time, hoping to divert the inevitable conversation. Getting back at her, he took her by surprise by grabbing her chin.

"Nice diversion, but we're gonna talk about it later, got it?" he said with a coquettish grin. She nodded vigorously with both fear and a slight tint of happiness. She just wanted to burst in laughter on his words and his quick change of demeanor from coy, to flustered, to coy once again. But this...grin...threw her off the tiniest bit. Was he implying they should- "Praetorians are known to be smart on positioning their teleportations near the attacker. You need to hang me over the edge so it teleports to the Sawws."

He had cut off her train of thought. She was a little glad she hadn't thought a little further and with a toss of her dark silver suitcase with pink trims, she turned to him and grabbed him by the foot. Yelling, she ignored him and dragged him to the edge of the cliff. Half-throwing him off, she held him tight by his right foot, already knowing of the metal there. She let herself fall off the edge with a "Whee!" evident in her voice as her boots screwed themselves into the edge of the cliff.

"Care to shoot them now?" she asked. Her own kittenish grin appearing on her face as he looked up at her. She could've sworn she saw a smirk on his face before pulling down his weapon and with an aim said something she didn't hear. "What?"

"It's not a Praetorian, you were right. The glint was its armor in the sunlight. It's a Minotaur."

She smirked, "Is that a pout I heard?"

"I don't think it's physically possible to _hear _a pout."

"I think it is. Shoot already."

"G-got it." He aimed down his sights a little more, stocking his weapon. "You might wanna brace a little...Achilles has one heck of a kick."

Knowing that he was referencing his sniper rifle, "Okay," was all she said.

"Okay..." there were a few moments of silence before he fired, a bullet hitting the Vex Grimm in the foot. The shot's recoil caused the two slam into the cliff and they let out a short grunt in pain for arm and stomach, respectively.

"Nice...but why the foot?"

"Why spoil the fun by making it possible for them to kill it easily with a bullet lodged in its chest. It may impede its movement, but its still one heck of a killing machine with only a damaged foot." As he said that, the Grimm teleported with a blinding blue light to the Sawws who had killed around-

"Ten Vex Goblins. They killed that many under a minute?!" Herra almost yelled.

"Can you pull me up now?" With a nod that he saw when he looked up at her, she easily swung him up, and slowly, ever so surely, pulled herself up with him.

"You're really light, you know that?"

"That's what Pyrrha said when she threw me around like a wrecking ball."

"A-a what?" she stuttered, "And who?"

"A wrecking ball. And my sister. We were in a match, Dustbent on winning. Both three-way champions in the Mistral Tournaments. In the seventh Tournament, we were the last two. So, she beat me by getting a chance at my foot," he pointed to his right foot, "And didn't turn the blade fast enough, severing the foot. Unknowing of the severed foot, she picked me up by my left one and swung me around like a marionette."

"O-oh..." was all she could muster as the two loomed over the edge, curious of the condition of the Sawws. "They look like they're having trouble with it, do you want to help them?"

"Nah," he said, "Let them suffer. Seem like a couple of a-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence, Nikos." Not needing to hear the harshness in her voice that was no higher than a whisper, he quickly complied.

"Y-yes, ma'am!"

She sighed as the Sawws finally stabbed it through the chest. "Come on, we have to rendezvous with them and make it to the bottom. Crane must be in a world of pain."

"I can fix up your stomach if you want me to," Patro offered, "Won't take too long."

"We can fix it after rendezvousing with the others. And yes, before you ask, I'm a-"

"Don't finish that sentence, Gunn," he glared at her, "You're human...leave it at that."

"R-right."

The two slid off the edge to rendezvous with the Sawws. Both Sawws stood silently and still as a Wyvern approached them.

"Nikos!"

"Yes?!" he yelled as the two slid down the steep cliffside.

"Save them! Shoot the wyvern in the eye!"

"Got it!" he yelled as he was kicked in the back by Herra. He instantly went flying forward, and slid to a stop between the two Sawws, took aim and fired.

"Do you two really _want _to die?"

**-= *Storytelling* =-**

**-= *Cafeteria, the next day* =-**

"And then I said," Anna interrupted, "'Way to ruin the moment, Nikos.'"

Pyrrha nudged him and leaned down to whisper in his ear, "You should've let her die."

"Why? And even if I wanted her to die, what would happen to Iridium?"

"Good point."

"And then I said-" the younger Nikos said as the two teams continuously conversed about the whereabouts and the happenings that went on around them during the field trip from the other day. It had been a week since then, and Troja, along with the Gunns, had gone on a mercenary trip to fulfill the wager made by the Trojan on the terms of forming a single team during the field trip. If Herra had been there during the storytelling at lunch, he would've been as glad as heck he hadn't mentioned that her blood was green, saying it was red instead. And defensibly, not saying anything of the sort of the Gunns and Sawws origins. The Sawws were greatly in debt to him for keeping such a secret.

"I can't believe she left _me, _of all people, in charge of the team. I've made huge problems with just trying to talk to them! Patro hates me, Joan might think I'm a burden by trying to just get him to stop! It's all wrong! Where is Troja?!" she demanded.

"She already told you by now, yes?" Professor Ozpin asked, "She's on a mission with the Gunns. She'll be back sometime this week."

"I can't wait that long!" Winter yelled back, tears threatening to form in her eyes due to frustration. "When will she be back?"

_Acting like a child like waiting for father to come home again, Winter? _Weiss mused from around the corner.

"I just said that she would be back this week, Miss Schnee," Ozpin said with his usual calm demeanor, "Now, if you'll excuse me. I have a meeting with the Vale Council."

"No!" Winter stood in front of him, "I want her back! Now!"

"How about this..." the Headmaster said slowly, nonchalant again by with a tinge of annoyance, "After I'm done with this meeting, we'll make you and your team take a test to see if she can come back, are you okay with that?"

_Oh no, _Weiss thought, _not __that__ test..._

"Deal!" Winter yelled, soon skipping in her step away from the Headmaster. He ran a hand through his hair and was almost startled by Weiss.

"How did you trick her so easily?"

"She was acting like a child, so I made her take bait like a child."

"Is that frustration I hear," Weiss smirked, "That's a first for the 'World-Renowned-Calm-Demeanored-Headmaster-of-Beacon,' eh?"

"Not now, Miss Schnee," he walked away.

"I didn't hear a 'no,' so I'm going to assume it's true!"

Ozpin sighed loudly with two fingers on the bridge of his nose as the heiress ran around the corner, "I don't get paid enough for these students."

"I thought you loved your students."

"Ah, Jaeger Schnee, what're you doing here on this fine day?" Ozpin regained his calm.

"Well, I wanted to check on my daughters...and I couldn't help but overhear-"

"Mister Schnee," Ozpin said with patience no longer, "I was frustrated, and now we have a meeting with the Council, shall we just go?"

"Okay," Jaeger said, walking with Ozpin towards their office. "But what of the Iris," he asked, "Didn't she finish her mission yesterday? Why did you lie to poor Winter?"

"Troja asked me the moment she got back, she said-"

**-= *Training Room* =-**

"Ugh! No, Patro! Left Vanguard, not the right! Like the first Combat Class we had with Troja!"

"Be more specific next time!"

"Pay attention, Patro!" Iridium yelled and Patro was forced to the ground for the umpteenth time.

The Sawws agreed to train the Trojans once again but to no avail. For long moments at a time, Winter, time and time again, tried her best to coordinate her team, only to be met with failure.

"That's like, the seventeenth time you guys failed to overpower us," Anna said nonchalantly. Winter only lost more and more confidence every time Anna counted their losses.

"Don't say that, Anna," the Nikos for once defended them, "We're trying our best. We have a Troja-in-training over there," he pointed to Winter, "And she's still doing a damn better job than any of us would on our first week!"

The second he finished that conversation, he yelped as Winter put her hand on his shoulder. Ignoring the yelp, Winter looked up at him as he looked back, "Thank you...for that."

Remembering Herra's words back at the Sapphire Mountains, he visibly blushed, all but barely a bright pink.

"Is that a blush, Nikos?" She continued to barrage him.

"N-no! Let's just try this again, Snowflake!"

"Stop giving me nicknames!" she chased him around in circles as Joan tried to find a way to stop a fight between the two before it started. The Sawws just laughed at their expense.

_They're doing better than before... _Ozpin mused as he leaned against the frame of the door on the inside of the Training Room, _Should I call them out now, or should I just muse at their expense? Go, Winter! Rip his hair o- that's unorthodox. Better stop them now, before I start thinking lewdly. _He coughed loudly.

The cloud of white and maroon soon lifted as everyone stared up at Ozpin who slowly approached them from the door. Winter had Patro in a headlock with a free hand grabbing at his hair.

"It's time for that test I talked about. I'm done with my meeting, Winter. Come on. Let's go, Trojans."

"Wait," Patro spoke up as he pushed off a tumbling Winter and stood up, "What test?"

"Did Miss Schnee not tell you?" Ozpin asked.

"Oh, right!" Winter got up quickly and acted like nothing happened, "I forgot to tell you! He said if we take this test thing, Troja can come back!"

"What's impeding her return?" Patro continued. Winter shrugged and looked at Ozpin who visibly gulped. Patro was the only one who noticed this.

"She and the Gunns are stuck in a cave east of the Emerald Forest," Ozpin said quickly, alibi forming in the back of his head and rolling off his tongue like it was practiced, "They have been cornered by a King Taijitsu known as: 'Queen Aranae.'"

"Aranae?" Joan spoke up, "Isn't that like, a spider name or something?" She shivered immensely.

"That's the thing," Ozpin said, "It killed the occupying spiders the day before Initiation and we've had travelling problems because of it. It also killed the spiders' queen, Queen Arachne."

"O-oh..." Joan meekly replied.

"Why is the King Taijitsu named the _Queen _Aranae?" Iridium asked.

"We found out it was female."

"Do Grimm really have...parts...that visibly separate Gender, though?" Anna spoke up herself.

"Y-yes..."

"What 'parts?'" Winter asked loudly, causing the heiress to stop her advance just outside the door.

"OZPIN!" Weiss yelled, finally bursting through the door, "WHAT ARE YOU TELLING WINTER?!"

"I-it got o-out of h-hand! R-run!"

Soon Ozpin and the three teammates of team Trojans ran out with him.

"You two..." she said quietly, looking at the Sawws who gulped loudly, "Speak."

**-= *The Maw of the Queen Taijitsu* =-**

**-= *The Eastern Edge of the Emerald Forest* =-**

Winter panted as the others ran as far as they could with the Headmaster.

"Headmaster..." Patro grunted out, "Don't ever do that again..."

Ren's eye twitched in the distance.

The Headmaster simply gestured at the cave in a business-like stance quietly and waited for the team to just enter at their own risk. He sipped loudly from his cup.

"Is this it?" Joan asked. Ozpin only continued to point at the cave. Leaning in, they could barely hear him breathing quickly.

Troja facepalmed in the distance.

They had ran several thousand meters through the Emerald Forest. Winter being the only one with small stamina barely making it with the others continued to pant as the other two quickly found their bearing and their breathe. Winter sighed as she slowed them down once more. _What good am I if I can barely keep up with the people I have been entrusted to command. Big Sis would probably do a better job than I have._

Weiss sneezed loudly, but couldn't place her finger on why.

"Look..." Winter barely said as she slowly got her breath back, "We should...enter it as...quickly as possible. Like...right now."

"Winter, you're tired. We should re-"

"And let your friends die to the Queen Taijitsu?" Ozpin finally spoke up with a sip of his coffee once more. Everyone staring at him, he didn't lose his calm demeanor this time. "I would recommend doing what your Acting Captain has told you to do." He gave a slight tilt of his head towards the cave as he said so, before sipping on his mug again.

"R-right," Patro stuttered. "Let's go..." he mumbled something inaudible.

Herra smirked in the distance.

"Did you say something about Herra?" Winter asked curiously, but obliviously.

"N-no!" Patro yelled, "L-let's just get Troja and the Gunns or the Sawws will be all up and down our a-"

"Let's just go, guys..." Joan interjected.

"Okay!" Winter beamed before the headed into the cave.

_I hope Troja can- _Patro tried to think.

"I hope we can get Troja out of here..." Winter said as they coursed through the caves. It was rather dank and dark.

"This is absolutely disgusting!" Patro yelled, echoes ringing through the cave.

"Did anyone bring a torch?" Joan asked.

"Nope!" Winter kept on going unfazed, "Use your Semblance to copy Ozpin's."

"Ozpin's?" Patro asked, "Do you know what his is?"

"Clairvoyance," Winter answered.

Ozpin coughed just outside the mouth of the cave.

"I can only copy people's Semblances if they're in twenty meter's length of me," Joan said. "I can't copy his Semblance from here."

"Well, we're going in blind then," Winter said with a sigh.

"Someone at least make a little light with their Aura," Patro tried.

They all looked to Winter, if she was at all visible.

"I don't have a really big Aura..."

Yang uncontrollably giggled in the distance. When she stopped, she asked herself, "What the Dust?"

"Just use echolocation," Patro said nonchalantly." It's easy, look." He began to yell through the cave as the three stopped.

"Echolo-what now?" Winter asked.

"Echolocation is when you use sounds to find the position of objects when you can't see..." Joan summarized. "Or something like that..."

"You're close, but still correct," Patro agreed, "There are two paths ahead of us. Queen's in the left one."

"What's in the right one?" Winter asked.

"A secondary path to a whole load of..." he trailed off. "Wait."

"Wait for wha-" cutting Winter off, he yelled loudly towards what she believed would be the right fork.

"Eggs..."

"Eggs?" Joan asked, "I don't think King Taijitsae lay eggs..."

"What about female ones?" Joan asked.

The three of them gulped loud enough for it to echo through the cave system.

"There may as well be hundreds of them down there...we should kill the Queen quickly and high tail it out of here with Herra and the others..." Patro said. No one seemed to notice he said Herra instead of Troja, much to his happiness.

"R-right! Left Vanguard, Patro?" Winter tried smirking.

"Whatever. Let's just go. This way." He grabbed both of their hands and walked towards the left path, dragging the two girls away.

They may as well have been down there for a few seconds before multiple hisses sounded. The three of them stopped.

"Echolocation isn't going to work against these things in pitch black," Patro said. "Think up something for light! Quickly!"

Winter gulped. She wished she brought something down there with them. "Wait, Patro!" she beamed happily.

"What?"

"Don't two swords make sparks if they're rubbed together on the bladed sides? Like last week during our first fight against team Chains!"

Patro was quiet for a moment. "Yes, but only if a blade has Ignition Dust! I don't have any!"

"Here," she nudged a phial on his side, "This should help you." The snakes around them continued to hiss even louder.

"What's this?"

"Ignition Dust. You can thank me later."

"Okay, then..." he opened the phial with a light pop, confusing a few snakes. Hesitation stopping their advance of hisses that successfully creeped out the trio as Patro rubbed Ignition Dust on the bladed side of his scope after he mechashifted Achilles into its sword mode.

"Are you done?" Winter asked.

"Yes. Joan," he nudged her, "Your turn."

"Got it." She unsheathed Lux and Patro found her blade, nearly cutting his fingers. He placed the blades together.

"Alright, we need to slice on three, got it?"

"Got it." Joan repeated.

"One..." Patro sounded.

"Two..." Winter continued.

"Three!" Joan yelled as the two sliced their swords together causing sparks to fly. What they hadn't taken into account was the old wood around them.

"Wood?" Winter asked. Sheathing her weapon with the other two in confusion.

"Yes!" Patro yelled frantically, pulling the both of them as the wood ignited, "Flammable and support beams can kill humans easily!"

"Wha-Ahhhh!" the two girls screamed as they were dragged past the burning mini Taijitsu. One caught on Winter's arm.

"Aw..." Winter said as she scratched the bottom of its neck. It hissed in enjoyment of the feeling. "Can we keep it?"

"As long as it doesn't kill us later." Patro said. The snake hissed twice with nods.

"Okay!" Winter beamed once more, allowing the snake to wrap around her arm loosely. "Uh..."

"What is it?!" Patro yelled, still dragging the girls with him.

"Does it strike you odd that the Taijitsae here are red and blue instead of white and black?"

As soon as they made it to the end of the wooden path, he let the two of them rest a little. Picking up a piece of wood as a torch, he brought it down to the snake, and it was indeed red and blue. "It might be...an indication...of gender..." he let out.

The Taijitsu nodded twice with hisses in approval.

"Hmm, she seems to understand what were saying..." Joan said.

The Taijitsu, once again, nodded in approval.

"Should we name her?" Winter asked, continuously stroking the snake. "I call Medusa!"

"Wasn't Medusa-" the snake cut off Patro with two nods and hisses.

"I think she likes it," Joan said with a smile.

"Well, then, Medusa!" Winter yelled, "What do you think of Queen Aranae?"

Medusa hissed angrily.

"I don't think she likes her own queen," Patro said as Medusa nodded.

"Well, then!" Winter yelled again, "Lead the way! We want to kill'er!"

It began to slither quickly off of her arm, then deeper into the cave. "Wow," Patro yelled, dragging the others with him, "She's fast!"

Joan and Winter simply giggled loudly, causing Patro to laugh on his own. Soon, with the torch, they made it into a large, chamber-like room. Rounded at every edge, giving off a circular feel to the room. Curves here and there, and the occasional crater in the walls indicating a large creature's attack. "I don't think whoever's gone in here survived for very long..." Joan said truthfully.

"Heh," Patro chuckled, "Gunns can handle anything. And if Troja is with them, they're sure to survive. Now, where's Medusa?" As he asked that, Medusa slid up Winter's arm who giggled playfully with the hissing lunatic. "There she is..." _Why am I agreeing so easily with this Taijitsu. I guess they could be friendly if reasoned wi-_

He was cut off as a larger, more menacing hiss reached their ears within the rooms. He threw the torch to the middle. Nothing.

"Do you think it was afraid and slithered off?" Winter asked. Medusa only shook her head as a 'no.' It tilted its head towards the torch. The three of them looked more closely. Soon the dirt in the area looked like it was shifting around in small mounds. Showing lines of them, moving around the torch. As they saw this, they unsheathed their weapons.

"What do you eat, Medusa?" Patro pursued in conversation in boredom of the situation. She nudged his shoulder. "Humans, huh...hehe...do you eat other Grimm?" It nodded happily.

"Patro," Joan said. "I don't think this is the time for conversation."

"Sorry...wait...why does Medusa only have one head?" They all looked towards Medusa and, sure enough, she only had one head. Patro continued, "Does Queen Aranae only have one head as well?"

Medusa nodded vigorously.

"Is that it?" Patro asked, pointed at the mounds still pacing around the torch. She shook her head. "The tail, then?" She nodded.

"This conversation seems a little one sided...eh?" Joan said with a smile, causing the others to laugh with Medusa happily hissing on her own.

"Wait..." Patro stopped the laughter slowly, "What happened?" The mounds stopped slithering around the torch and the three looked at each other.

"Oh, sh-" Patro couldn't finish his sentence as the Queen burst out of the ground, hissing at them loudly. A white vortex appeared behind it, pulling it back. With resistance, the creature kept its head far from it.

"I don't have a lot of time! Run!"

"We're not leaving you!" Patro yelled, "Joan, copy and try to cut its head off, I'll distract it!"

"Got it!" Joan yelled.

Winter watched in lament as the other two disobeyed her command. "I told you to get out, dammit!" she yelled, "Troja put me in command for a reason! Not to-"

"She put you in command so we'd live, dammit!" Patro cut her off, "Now keep it down! We're decapitating the damn thing!" He mechashifted Achilles into a rifle and began to fire at it, shooting out its right eye. Screaming in pain, it tried to move forward, but to no avail as Joan jumped up on it. She mechashifted Lux into a sickle and brought it around the Queen's neck. She hung lowly beneath its neck using gravity to help cut through its thick hide, and with her free hand, created a blue vortex beneath her, pulling her sickle with her with more powerful strength.

Despite all the pulling, the Queen began to fare brightly as it began to push forward towards Winter. Patro, noticing the vortexes beginning to die down, stopped firing. He mechashifted his rifle's scope into a blade and grabbed Medusa, throwing the hissing snake to the side.

"What are you doing?!" Winter yelled as her vortex broke.

"Saving you!" he stepped in front of the Schnee before the Queen rebounded and attacked her. Blocking the attack, Patro was flung to the side into a wall when the Queen came around with a rounded attack. Joan was flung around its neck, sickle still in hand, and flung back near the torch.

"Patro! Joan!" Winter yelled, "Ah!" she yelled louder as she cringed and waited for the Queen to dig its fangs into her fleshly figure. Only to hear an electrical crackle and a pained hiss. She stayed there for a moment, eyes still shut and whimpering could be heard from her.

"You have _got _to be kidding me..."

"Huh?" Winter opened her eyes that were glued to the floor in her feeble stance. She looked up to see a block of blue light protruding from the floor. The occasional silver gleaming over it. She looked up further to see Troja, arms locked high in an x-block, holding up the block of energy that so protecting her from the fanged beast. "Troja!" she yelled, clinging to her.

"Don't worry, Winter," Troja said as she let go of her, "We got this. Gunns!" she yelled, "Our turn!"

"Already?" one came from the shadows.

"Crane?" Winter asked his burly voice through its radio.

"Yup. Come on, Herra." he said nonchalantly. Herra came out from the other side.

"Yeah, yeah. I got it." The two planted their boots to the floor, screws digging into the dirt. Their chain guns began to rev up.

Joan slowly got up to see the situation, "Troja?" She then passed out.

"Ugh, we'll get to her later. Winter, go pull out your boyfriend!"

"He's not my boyfriend!"

"Just pull him out while we handle this," she turned back to the Taijitsu who was angered beyond limit, "Fire."

"Have a nice day," Crane said, "or else."

"Turn that frown," Herra said, "upside down."

The revving ceased into a long whir before they fired at the Taijitsu's neck. The Queen's necks showed nicks here and there from the sheer barrage of bullets. The Taijitsu, vulnerable, was met with the large block of pure energy from earlier as its head was knocked clean off from it. Leaving the corpse on the ground.

"Well..." Crane said.

"That was anticlimactic," Herra finished as the Grimm quickly turned into a black smoke.

Both of their boots unlocking, Crane helped Troja with Joan and Herra headed over to Patro, who Winter was having trouble with.

"I got it..." Herra said, grabbing his waist.

"What are you doing?!" Winter yelled.

"This is how you get people out of walls like this," she said calmly as she pulled him out with a grunt.

"T-thank you, Herra..." he said as he grabbed her outstretched had to pick him up.

"No, problem. And I _still _owe you for both saving my life and Crane's...actually..."

"It's one-one, now," he said with a chuckle.

"Who's keeping count?" Herra asked.

"I am." The two smirked at each other. Well, Patro couldn't see hers because of her visor, unfortunately.

"What just happened?"

The two tensed up at Winter's words. "I thought I told you that I saved her life, as well as Crane's, Winter."

"Oh, yeah!" she yelled, "I just didn't care!"

The two of them facepalmed, one skin against skin, the other metal against metal.

"Winter," Troja said, walking over. Winter visibly flinched, "I have successfully evaluated your leading skills. I'm going to teach you more about it later, understand?"

Winter thought for a moment before trying to answer, "Are you telling me you didn't go out on a mission at all and used it to stalk us with permission?"

Troja flinched more incredibly than Winter had, glad that the cave was too dark for anyone to see her blush. Before Patro could jest or Troja could retort, Ozpin finally made it through the cave. "Yes and no..." a snake slithered up his arm and wrapped around it loosely.

"Medusa?!" Winter yelled, going over to pet the happily hissing creature.

"That's what you named her?" asked Ozpin. "I was trying to think of a name for so long..."

"Wait," Patro said. "Medusa belongs to you?"

"Yes, I picked her up once walking by here. She's really friendly, isn't she?" The trio nodded.

"Wait, so you're telling me," Troja said, "That you had a pet snake all this time and you didn't tell me?!" Troja went frantic, petting the snake every which way. The snake continued to hiss happily at the attention it got.

Crane chuckled slightly as Herra walked over to Patro. "Now you have to deal with this!" she said jokingly with a pat on his back and gesture with her free hand towards Troja.

Patro only chuckled, "More of a problem than you are!" He slapped her back hard, making her slam a foot on the ground to keep her from falling.

"What?! What did I do?!" Herra yelled.

"Nothing! That's the thing!" he pulled out his Scroll and let her see pictures of odd angles of the two hanging over the cliffside. "Professor Peach sent me these!" His smile soon became coquettish, causing her to blush immensely from behind her visor.

"Oh, no you don't!" Herra yelled as she chased him in circles around the dying flame in the middle of the chamber, "Com'ere!"

"Gah! Stop!" Patro pleaded but to no avail. She took him in a headlock and scratched his head with her knuckle.

"How do you think Anna felt!"

"I don't know! It was hilarious at the time!"

"Not as hilarious as this, right?!"

"No!" Patro tried, "No, it wasn't! Now lemme go~!" He caught her off guard by slamming a backhanded fist into her right foot, causing her to fall. A wall of a dark pink lifted as clashes of metal and screams of pain were heard eliciting from the cloud.

Troja sighed at the sight, "What's the fastest way out, Professor Ozpin?"

"Up and out," he said nonchalantly as he walked to the middle and kicked the torch to the side. Its almost dying, Ozpin aimed the bottom of his cane towards the ceiling. "This should work nicely..."

He fired and a bullet took out the ceiling, leaving the room as dusty as can be with a fog with tan. Light trying its best to pierce through the thick cloud.

Patro, with Herra in a headlock, looked up towards the ceiling with her. "We were _that _close to the surface?!" Patro yelled.

"Yes," Herra said, lifting him off his feet as he lay on her back. Patro let go of her neck in a headlock and changed it so he could keep a hold on her.

"What are you doing?!" he yelled as she walked towards the hole in the ceiling. Ozpin got out of the way.

"Giving you a piggyback ride." She jumped as Patro gave out a girly scream.

"Some girl's in trouble!" Raven yelled, as she looked east of her position in the Emerald Forest. Professor Peach facepalmed.

"My turn!" Joan yelled, jumping on Crane's back.

"W-what the Dust?!"

"Ride, my slave!" Joan yelled happily. Troja deadpanned at her change of heart.

"Quirky and then sadistic, huh?" Troja mumbled with a large shiver.

"Hya! Hya!" Joan yelled, hitting Crane on his lower back with the flat side of her blade, "Go, my slave!"

"Y-yes, ma'am!" he yelled, running to the hole and jumping out. Ozpin jumped after them.

Troja looked at Winter who had pleading eyes. "Oh, heh. No, you're on your own," Troja said and walked to the hole, jumping out.

"Fine..." Winter said quietly. She walked to the hole in the ceiling and jumped out.

What they didn't notice, were the spiders seeping in through the small entrance and popping in through the walls.

**-= *Physical Touch* =-**

**-= *Dust Physics, Eighth Period* =-**

"And that, is how you create Ignition Dust," Professor Vermillion informed the class as he picked up the red Dust off the table with a plate. "Please do not mix this with Fire Dust unless you specialize in Explosive Dust," he glanced at the blonde brawler for a moment and she giggled a little. "Are they any questions?" he looked around for a moment, "Yes, Miss Iris?"

"When are we going to mix Ignition and Explosive Dust, Professor?"

"Tomorrow," he said, "I need to talk to Professor Peach. She has the Dust I require to properly teach you tomorrow. And, Miss Iris, please rest well tonight. I need you especially for tomorrow's class."

"Why?" she tilted her head.

"I need a shield..." he gestured towards the blonde brawler.

"What?" the blonde brawler asked.

"I don't get it..." Troja said.

"Ugh, for the love of Dust!" he exclaimed. "Yang Xaio Long specializes in Explosive Dust and I don't want her to blow up the bloody classroom!"

"He's British!" someone yelled in the back of the room.

"Miss Sustrai, do you mind specifying in...whatever _British _means?"

"It's a type of person from the Forgotten Era with an unusual accent in English, despite being the ones who created English itself."

"How smart of you, Sustrai..." Patro said with disgust, "For once..." he mumbled.

"What was that, strawberry?"

"That's it!" Pyrrha yelled, "You can insult my friends! But you _cannot _insult my little brother!"

"Pyrrha," Patro said, "Let me handle this."

"Aw, your big sister is looking out for you," the Sustrai said with mockery.

The entire team of Trojans and Pyrrha began to clench their fists.

"Now, now, students," Professor Vermillion said, "Let's not get hasty here..."

Feeling the cold Auras finally lift, he sighed. "Don't want another catastrophe like last year..." he mumbled as the bell rang. As the students packed up to leave class, he yelled at them, "Remember to read chapter seven of our Dust Physics books by tomorrow! And your homework is to create your own Ignition Dust for class tomorrow. I'll have the Fire Dust ready by then!"

The students let their scattered acknowledgments echo through the room as they poured outside of the classroom. As it was the last class, the students headed back to their dorms.

"Dust, she annoys me to the fullest!" Patro gritted his teeth in agony. He was easily enraged by an upperclasswoman and he just...wanted to gauge her eyes from her very-

"Patro..." Herra said from behind him with a placating hand on his shoulder. This calmed him down easily, much to his chagrin when he realized she noticed this. "Calm down...we can get her later during Fourth Period tomorrow. I'll get Professor Goodwitch to rig the match-"

"I look out for me and mine," he said curtly, pushing her hand off. "That don't count you unless I conjure it does! Now," he turned fully to her, "You stuck a thorn in the White Fang's paw." He referenced the job she had gone on with Troja the other day, "That tickles me a bit. But that means I have to step twice as fast to avoid them. And that means turning down plenty of their job offers! Even the honest ones."

He finally brushed her off and stormed off to his room, leaving cracks in the floor in his wake. "Herra..." Crane called from behind.

"Nothing, Crane..." she walked in the opposite direction Patro did. "I'm fine," She added sternly.

"How come all the awkwardness turns to _me _every time?" he complained, following Herra to their dorm room quietly.

"What an odd bunch of students..." Professor Vermillion mused aloud, only to be startled by Troja.

"I know..." she said, "But they have their problems to deal with, they just don't know who to turn to for help...leaving it on their captains for the deciding factor..." she sighed. "Why do _I _have to deal with bullies?"

"You don't..." Professor Vermillion said, "Bring them out on a mission tomorrow, eh?" he punched her shoulder lightly, "I'll even recommend it to Ozpin, who'll undoubtedly agree. They can let off some steam. Just take tomorrow off, and I'll have Miss Xaio Long try to teach you later."

"Thank you," Troja said with a smile at him as she walked away. "Needed to blow off some of my own steam as well..."

"You could _ask _me before recommending my..._undoubted_...permission to my students..." Professor Ozpin said, coming up from behind the Professor who turned around briskly.

"It's a common thing said amongst the teachers, my good sir!" Professor Vermillion said.

"Teachers teach _children, professor."_

"I know, I know, Ozpin."

"Oh..." his voice began to garble out like a messed up radio. His figure seemed to turn into pixels as his body turned extremely different. Landing on an all familiar- "Am I really Ozpin, though?"

"T-Torchwi-"

"Shh..." Roman put a finger on his lips. He retracted them, "Phase Three has begun. Cinder's orders."

Professor Vermillion scoffed, "You can't _possibly _believe I'm going to follow that crazed woman once again!" He nearly yelled, "I'd rather die!"

"Permission granted," he bluntly said, lifting his cane. "I read a line from ancient text back in the Forgotten Era. Want to hear it?" The ever present cigarette in his mouth gleamed brighter at the end for a few seconds.

"What?" Professor Vermillion said slowly after a long pause.

"Hasta la vista..." he placed his finger on the trigger, "...baby..."

Before he pulled the trigger, a blackened blade that seemed to harbor black scales, went through the man's body. The man groaned as the blade was pulled out of his body, soon falling.

"Cind-"

"Roman..." she cut him off. "I _specifically_ told you _not _to screw with him."

"I'm sorry, Cinder!" he defended. "This disguise is so fun!" She glared at him. "Watch!" His form changed into pixels before it turned into Cinder. "I'm a big, bad girl, who can't handle Roman's d-"

With a slash, she broke the wristwatch, causing him to turn back into Roman.

"Aw, you're no fun today..." he barely got out before she turned to walk away.

"Let's go, Torchwick," she said curtly. "We have a lot of work to do..."

"So pushy..." he mumbled, walking out after her, leaving the dead body behind in his tracks.

**-= *Dusty Old Qrow* =-**

"This landing is going to get pretty interesting!" the pilot yelled to the back of the Bullhead.

"Define 'interesting,'" a dusty old crow yelled back.

Taiyang, along with the rest of his team that still lived, were in a Bullhead heading towards the central Vacuonion Desert in search for remains of White Fang information in old ruins. They had flown over hundreds of miles of desert to no end, looking for the damned ruin.

"Oh Dust, oh Dust, we're all gonna die?" he called back to Qrow.

"Was that the primary buffer panel?"

"It did seem to resemble-"

"Did the primary buffer panel fall off my Dustdamned ship for no apparent reason?"

"Looks like!" Taiyang called back. Qrow ran a hand through his hair, pulling back his black hood, revealing his red hair with black highlights. Or more like...darklights...

"I thought Raven checked the Cold Dust reserves last week!" Qrow complained. "I have a very clear memory of it!"

"If she doesn't get us extra Cold Dust to engines we...might..."

"Might what?!" Qrow yelled.

"I don't know for Dust's sake!" Taiyang yelled back angrily. "Explode?!"

"Raven!" Qrow called.

"Yes, little brother?"

"Ugh!" he groaned, "Don't call me that! Anyways-"

"What were you two even on about this time?" she asked annoyed. She had to deal with the two's antics ever since she divorced Taiyang looking for some damned prize somewhere in Atlas when they said they discovered something big. Turned out it was a _dusty old_-

_Qrow_ seemed to cut her off. "Stop interrupting me!" he yelled angrily. "I thought you said you checked the Cold Dust reserves last week! Primary buffer panel just came right off!"

"That was six months ago, Qrow!" she yelled as she neared the back and opened a compartment.

"My Bullhead doesn't crash!" he pointed at her as she turned around. "If she crashes, you crashed her!"

She scoffed as she climbed outside of the vehicle. "Doesn't look good," she barely yelled over the oncoming winds. "We _might_ crash!" she yelled with an awkward smile.

Qrow then walked back to the cockpit. "We crashing?" Taiyang asked.

"Crashing," Qrow confirmed. "Just get us on the ground."

"Oh," Taiyang chuckled. "That'll definitely happen!" The Bullhead began to increase in speed. Qrow went back to check on Raven.

"Are those incendiary Dust explosives?"

"Yeah, what of them?" Raven asked curiously as she stacked them on their belt. "I get pretty excitable with my options open." She placed her weapon into her sheath.

"No explosives."

"What?!"

The ship seemed to slow down, but was ever so slowly moving forward.

"No grenades!"

"Qrow!" Taiyang called from the cockpit. Qrow came up.

"What?"

"We're stabilized now. I'm heading back to ready up."

"Got it." Qrow then switched positions with Taiyang as he headed back to ready up.

"Those explosives?" Taiyang asked Raven.

"Yeah, Qrow doesn't want them."

"Raven," Taiyang said with annoyance. "We're raiding the place, not occupying it."

With a sudden whoosh, the entire Bullhead seemed to stop instantly, causing Taiyang and Raven to tumble around the ship a little before it briskly landed on the ground. Qrow came from the cockpit.

"So, if you two are done...messing around...we can get a move on, yeah?"

The two looked at their position. Taiyang quickly pushed off a straddling Raven. "Whatever..." Taiyang mumbled. "Never letting you take driver's seat ever again."

Qrow smirked a little before the three of them headed into the sandstone ruin. Evidently a castle, the ever present cracks running up and down walls...left and right. The occasional tower looming on by as they crossed the area, weapons raised.

"This place doesn't feel right..." Taiyang said.

"Sure as Dust something ain't right," Qrow agreed.

"Quiet!" Raven half-yelled, quieting the two. The three of them halted in low stances against a wall, aiming their weapons at a large, olden wood gate from around the corner. The usual dark metal fastenings on them. The door lightly creaked open.

"Drezhah!" something quietly called from the inside and the door quickly shut with a slam.

"I think I know what the White Fang ran from..." Raven mused aloud.

"What?" Taiyang asked.

"Fallen..."

"Damn..." Qrow said, "I hate these guys...Vex, more so."

"Agreed," Raven quickly said as she readied her weapon. "We need a ranged guy up here. Tai, do you mind?" she looked at him.

"Oh, you know me so well, Raven!" she scoffed at his mockery. "Now..." Taiyang readied his gauntlets. "I'm-I'm gonna die!" he lost his cool.

"Taiyang..." Qrow growled.

"Watch," Raven said, ignoring Qrow. "It's easy!" She got up and shoved him in front of the door which was some thirty to forty meters from him.

"Raven!" Qrow yelled as Taiyang began to become pummeled by pulse rounds from the door.

"Watch," she said unfazed by the Qrow. He shook his head angrily and did as she said.

Taiyang got up from the attack out of the wall he was pummeled into by the pelting pulse rounds. Confused growls elicited from the creatures that loomed behind the door. "You ripped my favorite shirt..." they looked down at his all too raggedy yellow tee he wore. Anger present on his face. His lilac eyes stayed lilac as his blonde hair turned into a fierce crimson. "DIE!" he yelled as he ran into them.

Qrow loudly facepalmed.

"He takes after so well to his daughter..." Raven said with a slight sob.

"Wait...I thought the saying was the other way around..." Qrow said he heard pain growls coming from the door as more and more Dust Rounds went off from his weapon.

"Shut up," Raven said fiercely. "You're ruining the moment."

"What mom-" he was cut off as Raven put a hand in front of his face. The shooting and the pained growls stopped for a moment, before Taiyang was heard screaming.

"There it is~!"

"She takes after her daughter too well!" Qrow yelled.

"She takes after _me, _Dustdammit!" Raven yelled at Qrow.

"Yang would actually agree with me, Raven..." Qrow said with another facepalm.

"Would you like to test that theory," she said sternly.

"No..." he quietly answered as the two got up to aid the wailing Taiyang.

"What an idiot..." Raven said as they approached the now half-ripped door. As they walked in, two large, humanoid figures loomed above Taiyang. Poised for a kill, the creature took notice of the two other intruders and leaped for them, only for Raven to stab the creature in the chest with a white blade. It froze the area around the wound, and with a twist, the area crackled and shattered, killing the creature. The other had its head blown off by Qrow's rificle...scyfle...whatever it was.

"Vandals are present, too," Raven said as she threw the creature off her weapon.

"Got it," Qrow said, running off to check the area. Gunshots, slicing and pained growls could be heard from around the corner. "Got it!" he yelled, "Perfectly fine!"

"He takes after Ruby, too..."

"I heard that!" he yelled as a few vandals began to liter the floor beneath her feet. "Captains are here, too!" a larger version of the vandals soon landed in front of her.

"Let's hope Hive Grimm aren't present!" she gave him a yell.

"They'd be fighting each other," Qrow yelled back. "It's not very possible."

"Define 'possible!'"

"Don't you _dare _copy me!" Raven merely chuckled as she leaned down to Taiyang.

"Are you going to get up yet, you big baby?"

"Ugh..." he groaned, "They got a cheap shot in..." he said as he slowly got up.

"Tai! Tai~!" Qrow yelled from around the corner.

"Ugh...every raid he's got to start callin' my name..." Taiyang growled.

"Tai, we got Reavers!"

Raven and Taiyang's eyes widened as Qrow rounded the corner with a Reaver Captain behind him.

"And Shanks!" Qrow added as he ran past the two, who soon joined him. Avian class Grimm flew around the corner. Small, but farfetched when it came to the vulgar liquid that could spew from the maw of its tiny mouth. Said liquid was highly acidic.

"Dammit!" Raven yelled, "Right when we had them! Be nice to have some grenades, don't you think?!"

"Whatever!" Qrow yelled back, "Let's just run~!"

**-= *End of Chapter Two* =-**

Well, then. That was longer than expected.

I'm still thinking about Omakes in the future!

Now, for the love of God, let the next Fanfiction begin!


	3. About as Mad as a Hatter

**_About as Mad as a Hatter_**

Yes, I'm going to continue this! Along with a new OC, I reintroduce to you Snowy Chains of a Trojan Horse! Recreate: Regenesis will be continuing! Just for now, I'm taking a little break off of that. Sorry for the long wait!

**Disclaimer:** I do not own RWBY, that belongs to Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth, extensively. I do not own Alice in Wonderland/Alice: Madness Returns, they belong to whoever contributed in making it (I don't know who they are). I do, however, own any and all OCs as well as twisted plot/Canon.

Now, for the love of God, let this Fanfiction begin!

**-= *A Mad Hatter is Afoot* =-**

_"Hysteria," _the thought bellowed. _"The most powerful Semblance Failsafe in the history of Remnant. The most notorious. The most bloody. And most haunting." _

It battered her up. It tore her from the inside out.

_"Hysteria is only activated when the__rare user's Aura is between the yellow and red," _it continued.

It ripped her from limb to limb in a numbing state.

_"But," _it went once more. _"Their Aura levels never hits the red."_

'Neverending,' as she'd put it.

_"It is a blessing," _the thought said. _"And a curse," _it added bitterly.

"A Semblance Failsafe," Professor Brance continued. "Is the Aura's last stand against an enemy. For example-"

_Professor Samantha Brance,_ she thought with contempt. _One of the most known teachers in the area, putting her in second place in most books. Second only to Professor Peach as far as she knew._

Her memories scattered, she tried her best to continue on with life. Her clothes may have been retro in some's eyes, but she didn't care. She didn't care if her weapon was 'overdone.'

Alice was Alice.

"Alice?" a voice called.

She looked up to find Ricky Road, her team leader, staring at her with concern. His brown eyes laced with determination to help. Pity, as she'd call it.

"I'm okay," she brushed him off.

She hated pity.

"Whatever you say, Alice," he said with a long sigh. He looked back up to pay attention to the Professor.

Alice was allowed to just sit and think in her class, the Professor having already known she could handle Semblance Manipulation quite well. The Professor also said that she _understood _her.

How do you understand someone who's lost their entire family in a house fire? How do you understand someone who could be as mad as a hatter for all she cared? How could you understand someone who had the Hysteria Failsafe Semblance?

You don't.

That's the way it went in society.

All the jeering, she could handle well.

But put her up on stage?

_No,_ she thought. _That wouldn't work._

Alice Bedlam? On a stage?

She shook her head.

By now she cared for no deaths, even after Professor Vermillion's over a month ago. Ozpin's Dust knows where, and Goodwitch has been a little more crazier than usual.

Now that Professor Port has stopped with his stupid stories, she'd say Professor Vermillion's death was well timed.

She didn't care for the stab wound through his chest, or the littered-about specks of black and sparks. She just didn't care.

People knew of her family's death, and everything she'd had to go through, so they held both no care for her, and did not dare mess with her.

And she daresay, one person that even tries to make fun of her, she'll murder them brutally. Maybe even to the point of controlling Hysteria.

The moment the school's population had discovered her Failsafe Semblance, they'd kept a bitter distance from her. Although appreciated, she couldn't help but feel more empty inside.

Okay, maybe her team was nice to her enough to help her through with the loneliness.

Perhaps they have removed the feeling.

Oh, who was she kidding? She's as mad as a hatter, and no one can help-

_Ping. Ding. Piing. Ding._

The bell rung its usual chimes, and the students were let out of class.

_Whatever,_ she thought. _Now that third period was over, let's have fun in the next class..._

* * *

Whatever she wanted to do at the moment was completely shattered.

She repeated the lines amplified throughout the amphitheater in her mind: _"Alice Bedlam of team Raspberry versus Orion S. Belte of team Snowy."_

Much to her discomfort, she stood up abrasively and walked down to the stage.

"Much different from the usual fights," Professor Goodwitch said. "Today, we'll have a change of grounds."

There were two rocket lockers that came from the floor on platform elevators. The doors swung open.

"You're not doing this because of the prank we pulled on Yin, are you?" asked Orion.

"Whatever do you mean?" Professor Goodwitch asked. A ghost of a smirk appeared on her lips before it turned back into a scowl. "Now get in."

The screens, left or right on top of the stage, showed a landscape with different types of obstacles - albeit, she couldn't see the entire area from their distance.

This boy. This opponent of hers. Orion Belte;

He wore a thin blue tee - a horrible decision, really - underneath multiple layers of leather bracers. Along his forearms and hands landed gauntlets, each other their own petty black designs. His pants, literally blue jeans - bad for her tastes - with their respective layers of leather bracers on their own, and a mighty belt. They were tucked in, a small bit jutting over the top, boots. Leather boots, with metal fastenings and even their own silver designs.

What she didn't get was where his weapon was. His dark blue eyes - barely any shine - stared off at Professor Goodwitch a moment.

Though maybe she shouldn't even be talking. She wore a dress. A bloody dress with white trims! Light blue, maybe that was cute to people. Her white tie that 'cutely' tied into bunny ears at the back. What people didn't get was the skull that came with it. Her black hair flowed down just past her shoulders. Her mascara just decided to be more underneath than above, creating almost sleep bags beneath her eyes. She didn't care, as long as it kept others away.

She made for the locker and shut the door on herself - his being hesitant, but doing it anyway.

On each locker - Alice the only one noticing - she put in the same password, meaning she was going to launch them off in the same location.

"Good luck," Professor Goodwitch said. "I am against this idea, as Grimm will also be there to annoy the both of you."

She pressed a few buttons on her Scroll. The beep began counting down from five.

4...

"In Ozpin's words..." she said slowly.

3...

"Chose wisely."

2...

"Whether or not to fight each other..."

1...

"Or the Grimm..."

_Awesome!_ she thought. _Sarcasm is most useful._

They launched through the ceiling.

* * *

She finally decided to kick the locker open. She decided she'd rest a few minutes, calm her mind and all. But it wouldn't have it.

The more she stayed there the more she looked stupid.

With a might slam, the door swung open.

She was met with utter defeat against blindness. Temporarily.

She was finally able to see more and heaved her body out of the infernal machine. She ripped her vorpal sharp knife out - Wonderland, what a beautiful name for a death machine...

Its edge keenly thin, being able to cut through most objects and all, she ran a hand on the flat side, checking on the Dust runes she recently placed on it.

Void Dust, that's good. She got the right one.

But against what? She couldn't judge his weapon balance, so she didn't know which Dust was the correct.

Well, Void Dust is mildly effective, so why not?

Eyeing her left for movement in a shuddering bush, she turned all her attention towards it.

Her_ normal_ Semblance was beautiful to most people...until they know who she was...

The Beowulf emerged from the bush and tried to growl, only to have a stab to the chest.

Passing an illegitimate distance of approximately ten meters, she disappeared into a fine blue wispy mist, butterflies appearing in her wake.

She ripped Wonderland from its dead body. It fell over, and slowly - ever so slowly - disappeared into nothing.

Indiscriminate murderer - like the Grimm - she was.

She killed any Grimm, for no reason.

_As a Huntress,_ her mind reasoned. _As a Huntress, you are to kill every Grimm you see._

Before asking herself what they did to humans, she smacked herself. She was getting stupid.

"Hey," a voice sounded. She turned into her blue butterflies once more, leaving the edge of the knife on Orion's throat. "Calm down-er, Alice."

"Aren't we supposed to be fight-"

"Or against the Grimm," he cut her off. "The Professor said either each other, or the Grimm."

"I fear no Grimm."

"Then why do you fear me?"

She deadpanned.

"What do you speak of?"

"Don't humans and Faunus fight what they don't understand?"

"Well, yes, but-"

"And what we don't understand," he cut her off. She glared at him. "We fear," he continued without skipping a beat.

"I don't fear you."

"Really?" he asked feigning incredulously. "Then put the knife down."

"You want me to put the knife down?" she asked with sheer anger - a raised voice, really.

"Calm do-"

"Do you want me to put the knife down?!" she interrupted him.

Just then, he ripped off his belt and lashed it out behind her. She cringed and shut her eyes for a slam to her back, only to hear a whip crack and a death rattle from a Beowulf.

She opened her eyes and looked behind her, surprised to find the neck of a Beowulf in a vice grip by Orion's Belt.

"You gonna kill it or what?" he asked with a strained voice. She looked to him to see he was having trouble. Looking back, it seemed that the Grimm was pulling against it. "Decapitate it, dammit!"

"Don't tell me what to do!" she yelled as she turned into blue once more, the blue essence ripping from the blade and creating an afterimage of itself.

It ran through the Beowulf's neck like it was literally nothing.

The belt whipped back and slapped him in the hand. "Gah!"

"Oh, don't be such a crybaby," jested Alice for once. She had never felt like insulting someone with mirth before, but easily kept a smile hidden.

"Whatever..." he murmured. It made her feel bad inside.

_Why do I feel bad?!_ she screamed in her mind from the swift change of heart. _Why do I feel like my Semblance's excess every time I dodge?! Every time those butterflies come out when I'm near him is exactly mirrored in my stomach!_

She calmed down with a heavy sigh and noted to find out later.

"According to this," he said as he looked on his Scroll. "They want us both to each kill twenty Beowulves, one Ursa Major and a Grimm Den. Should be easy enough..."

"Sarcasm?" she asked, forcefully pushing down the mirth that threatened to overwhelm her vocal cords.

"Definitely," he responded immediately. _Surely he must be used to it on contrast as I,_ she surmised. "I spy. With my little eye..." he started.

She looked up with an amused brow.

"33 Beowulves northwest..."

She deadpanned. "How can you be so sure?"

"Telescopic Vision, milady."

She flinched at the sudden name.

"Sorry, habit with the nicknames."

_Ah,_ she thought, though quiet.

"Well," he continued. "Telescopic Vision is my Semblance. Failsafe is Premonition. That's pretty much self-explanatory."

"Understood," she said indifferently.

"I see," he said. "Could you tell me yours, if you don't mind?"

"Huh?" she asked incredulously.

"Could you tell me yours, if you don't mind?" he repeated for her.

She was confused now. Not by her logic nor the butterflies in her stomach. Not because he didn't know her Semblance and Failsafe nor do people ask nicely...

"My Semblance is Phase," she said, no longer restraining the mirth or the smile she believe she had. "My Failsafe is Hysteria."

"What's that?"

"Which one? Phase? Well-"

"No," he cut her off. "What's Hysteria?"

_He didn't even know Hysteria?!_ she screamed in her mind.

"Is this some sort of jest?"

"Jest?" he asked. "No. What's Hysteria?" he repeated his question.

"You _must_ be joking me," she put a hand on her right hip and leaned into it. "_Everyone_ knows what the Failsafe Hysteria is."

"Not everyone," he said.

"Who in their right mind _wouldn't_ know that Failsafe?!"

He quietly pointed to himself, no change in face, no change in movement. Just pointing to himself.

She sighed and rubbed her forehead with a hand. "Oh, fine," she gave up. "Hysteria is one of the bloodiest Semblances known on Remnant," she said.

"I'll keep that in mind," he said simply. "How do you activate yours?"

"I can't," she said as they kept moving. "It goes on by itself."

"Can I think of it as bloodlust?"

_Bloodtlust?_ she thought with lament. _Never thought of it that way, but it works._

"Sure," she said.

* * *

Hallucination.

She hated it more than anything.

One moment she'd be somewhere, then she'd be in the next.

The second she'd come back, she was either happy or sad she missed an entire moment of her own life.

"Strange," the Cheshire Cat said. "You don't usually make friends. Nor make any at all."

"Friend?" she asked with a chuckle. "What makes you think he's a friend?"

"'Tis the butterflies in your stomach," said the Cheshire. "'Tis the smile," his voice continued to fill with mirth and got louder every sentence. "The mirth! You obviously love the boy!"

"I-I do not!" she rejected the idea. Though she couldn't help but feel-

"The red stain upon your cheeks say differently," he added. "'Tis a blush which roses rise."

"S-stop thi-this!"

"'Tis a stutter, reveal a mutter. A mutter reveal a definite truth."

"That doesn't even rhyme!"

"Continued denial only reaches the final."

"That makes no sense."

"Rejection is worse than projection."

"Projections?"

"'Tis a question you only know, Alice."

"I would suspect it a crush, only letting it blow itself away in the wind after a matter of time," she tried.

"A man once said he suspected God to be a clock maker, based on the fact that life is literally a time."

"What are you getting at?" she asked annoyed.

"I simply say, 'It is not a clock. 'Tis a neverending gear.'"

Her eyes widened, her mouth agape.

"So you finally see logic over madness," he said.

"I am not mad!" she returned.

"No," the Cheshire agreed. "No. _I_ am mad. You see the logic spilling over the madness. Like a waterfall over cliff."

She tilted her head. "You...you actually have logic?"

The cat's head removed itself and grew three sizes. Its body disappeared - leaving a head-only, constant-grinning cat, unfortunately. "I would say, I have layers of demeanor at your disposal," it almost whispered.

"My disposal?"

"My, my, _milady," _he said slyly. "My demeanors are yours to command." He literally disappeared, his wispy trail disappearing into her chest, just above her heart. "Use it wisely," a smaller version said before disappearing completely into the stream into which fell into her heart.

* * *

"Alice?"

"Yes?" she asked immediately. She knew to act instantly upon questioned after a hallucination to avoid confusion for the inquirer.

"You okay?" he asked with hands on her shoulders - she only realized. "You seemed dazed for a moment. We finished the match and class is over."

"I-I'm fine." The entire 45 minutes in a five minute bickering session with a bloody cat?!

"Well, do you want to get a drink. School is a half day today."

_Hmm,_ she thought. _That's not a bad idea. Almost like a da-_

"Sure," she cut herself off.

"Also," he said as the two walked away towards the cafeteria (or wherever he was bringing her). "I'd like to talk about your Failsafe. You looked pretty badass out there."

She stiffened and stopped. Her eyes widening wider than in the hallucination.

"What's wrong?"

"I used Hysteria again?" she asked, now slumping and walking ahead. He had to put a skip in his step or a small jog to keep up.

"What's wrong?" he asked once more. "It was awesome. You really sicced those Beowulves, and that Spider Den! Ooh!" he shivered, almost audibly. "I hate spiders."

"As do I," Alice responded, trying to regain her stoicism.

"Then how did you kill them so easily?"

"Hysteria re-"

"Ooh!" he cut her off. "Let me guess; You blindfold yourself with that white fog around you!"

"No-"

"Or is it just that you don't care! That's coo-"

"Orion Serenade Belte, I swear I will dissect you personally if you do not let me speak," she spat.

"S-sorry...h-hey! How did you know my middle name?!"

"I didn't," she said. "'Tis a guess. Now, would you be so kind as to offer me lunch?" she gestured to the cafeteria door in front of the two.

"S-sure...and...I'm sorry for being an idiot," he apologized. "Could you tell me what it was, then?"

"I forgive you," she responded. Her cheeks reddened. She never openly forgave someone, let alone did it in the first place. Her cheeks returned to white instantly. "Anyways, Hysteria removed all emotion from me, driving me to kill my enemy rather than be afraid of it."

"That's not good," he said instantly.

"'Tis my Semblance Failsafe," she remarked. "I cannot change it."

"No, I mean," he sighed. "I mean, it's not good to not fear your opponent."

"Why?" she asked as the two ordered their meal. "One Rocky Road, please."

He threw a few dollars and ordered. "One Neapolitan, please."

After a few moments, they turned to a table - glad in their right minds that they actually had ice cream for lunch. "So," she gestured to his food as he dug into it hungrily - like a starved dog - and said, "You were saying."

"Ah, yes," he said after swallowing the chocolate side of the Neapolitan - not all of it, mind you. "I meant it's not good to not fear your enemy. Fearing your enemy is number one in all books."

"Not all of them."

"Who?" he asked curiously.

She pointed to herself.

He began to laugh. "How ironic!"

Noticing why he laughed (having been copied from the forest when he pointed to himself on not knowing about the Hysteria Failsafe Semblance), she gave out a hearty laugh.

_Now that was just stunning, _he thought. _More so than her usual stoic side she shows. Oh, what am I thinking? I'm no match for whoever is probably falling head over heels for her. I won't say I'm the only one, that._

"Well," he recovered from their bout of laughter. "You should always know your enemy-"

"I do, I do," she retorted, though a smile was evident on her face.

"I know you do," he said with his equally playful smile. "But, what I mean is, their intelligence. Their ability. Even their damn packs should be regarded. Their strategies! No Grimm is without intelligence!" he taught her.

"Interesting," she said. "I always used to think that Grimm were unintelligible."

"Come," he simply said after finishing the last bite of his ice cream, she already having done so in the last five minutes.

* * *

The Library.

She never thought she'd been in this part of a school for a while.

He dragged her through other quiet students and sat her down in a chair. He went missing in between the bookshelves and returned almost immediately.

"Here," he said, opening a large book. "Read the first line."

She looked at him curiously before reading the line of text.

_"You are as only as smart as your opponent."_

"This doesn't make sense," she said. "What if you had several opponents? What then?"

"The less smart each of them are." He turned to a new page. "Hmm, it's gotta be here somewhere..."

She watched him for a moment, tilted head, and just basked in his view. _His face was perfect, mind you,_ she thought. _Maybe we could be thought of as-_

"Here," he said, slamming a finger down on the book. "This says-"

The two continued to secretly love each other's presence without telling them. Occasionally an unnoticed blush would reach either's cheeks, the usual laughter would quietly sputter from the two. If anything, Alice would eventually realize that she'd have to control these demeanors she acquired, as the Cheshire Cat would control it by default until her realization.

* * *

Alice Bedlam finally retired to her room after a long day at school. It wasn't bad at all, as she was with Orion.

She walked through the room, ignored the other three for a while, and plopped onto the springy bed. She bounced a little ways before the bed was satisfied.

"Where were you?" Ricky, her team leader, asked. "You're usually here before any of us, face down, and sleeping."

"Yes," Sarah L. Erra, her teammate, asked. "Where were you? After fourth period, you kind of upped and disappeared."

Alice turned over on her bed, face up, as the two watched an unusual smile appear on her face. Not one either have ever seen before on a girl who had never smiled before. _It fits her,_ the two surmised. "With a friend," she said.

The two looked at each other before smiling. "A friend, eh?" Ricky asked. "Who is this friend, I might ask?" he said in her Forgotten Era Old English accent Alice usually succumbed to.

"Curiosity consumes me on the fact you made a friend outside of our team," she copied Ricky as best she could.

"Orion," she said with mirth. "We went to lunch and had a bit of ice cream," she said with an audible pause of a short chuckle (amazing her friends of her fluttering laughter). "Then we went to the library so he could lecture me on how to properly kill Grimm as I had no fear of them."

"Orion?" asked Ricky. "Of team SNOY?"

"Had?" asked Sarah. "Past tense?"

"He said that the fear of your enemy causes you to be more cautious in attacking them," she said as she rolled over a little to face the both of them. On her side, she continued. "And yes," she confirmed. "Orion S. Belte of team Snowy."

Ricky smiled as Sarah looked back with her equal grin. "I ship it," she said.

"As do I," he agreed. "What do you think, Neo?"

Neo smiled before signing to him.

He let out a huge laughter fit. "Haha!" he yelled. "Tied Destiny! That's cute!"

"T-tied..." Alice tried to repeat with a blush. "D-des-destiny!"

"Yes!" laughed Sarah. The entire team did know sign language. Alice then switched demeanors entirely.

"If you do not stop, I daresay I will rip your throats out." Hearing only Neo's fits of laughter through the springs in her bed, Alice turned towards her. "And I will chop your hands off and give them Miss Xiao Long of Second Year Team RWBY, do you understand?"

Neo stopped instantly let her head droop a little.

Ricky changed the subject. "About that," he said a Neo's raising head. "When are you going to apologize to her for nearly killing her. Surely, you're going to have to tell them sometime you were just acting to be with Roman for money from your Mercenary Sect, correct?"

She nodded with contempt with herself. She'd had to say sometime that it was just orders with some kind of apology. She really did not need an older girl - by a year, at that - trying to kill her every possible second. She signed an idea to him.

"Yin?" Ricky asked. "Good idea. Hey, Alice?"

"Yes," she asked, looking up to him expectantly.

"I need you to talk to Yin tomorrow. It's Saturday, and I think he'd be dying just to-" she shot him a glare. He sweat dropped. "Look, I need you to get him to talk to Yin. We can probably get rid of Neo's problem that way. Explain the situation to him, and then we can get to take it up with Yang, okay? Can you handle that?"

"Most definitely," Alice said with no malice. _Ha,_ she thought. _Cheshire Cat induced!_ _Oh, wait,_ she continued. _The hallucination! I can control my own freaking demeanors! Yeah!_

With that - and its being 8 at night - she fell asleep, eventually her team following in her wake.

**-= *End of Chapter 3* =-**

Hoped you like this new chapter! Originally, it was going to be chapter five, but seeing as during this stupid power outage, chapter four - in the making - was deleted!

With that, I wish you all a good day with this new OC in mind!

I was about as Mad as a Hatter!

Now, for the love of God, let the next Fanfiction begin!


	4. Announcements

_**Dear Readers,**_

I know you all have been waiting for a new chapter of SCoaTH, but unfortunately there are many errors that I need to fix. This story will stay up for a little longer before I take it down and reinstate newer and refined chapters. Apparently the first chapters were good, but there were a few things I need to fix. I have all of this straightened out by plot and all, and I know you're dying to get on with it already, but the introductions in the first chapters gave them false personalities as you saw later in said chapter. This will be fixed and all, but until then, I'm going to be rewriting them entirely. New fight scenes, new reasoning behind actions. New definitions and words along with better thought process. Longer paragraphs, too, I know a lot of you have peeves about that, because I do. Sometimes...I've seen people's critiques, okay?!

**Until then,**

**RustedFanfictions**

_**\- Now, for the love of God, let the next Fanfiction begin!**_


	5. Apologies

Dear Readers,

I regret to inform you all that this story will no longer be continuing. I have too many ideas to count and it is about as unable to be stopped like Noah's Flood, so I'm ending this. I will leave it up, however, because I do believe I can reboot it entirely. If I do, please return to take a look, and if it is of your interest yet again, please wait for the next chapters.

I have no schedule as of now to actually keep on track with each of my Fanfictions. To be honest, when working with my other accounts on Fanfiction and other things entirely, I have completely forgotten about this Fanfiction. I am really bad at this and despite working with it for so long, I'm still quite the amateur. Until I can learn how to keep track of my stories and _work on one at a time, _I am afraid I am still going to lose confidence in myself and refuse to write any more chapters as has been going on for the past few weeks. I've been blaming school thus far. **ahem**

Please accept the greatest of my apologies.

From, RustedFanfictions.

-And now, for the love of God, let the next Fanfictions begin!


End file.
